The Art of Adventurous Living
by Joyytailnote
Summary: One witch's answer to the age old question, "If you found a book which foretold your entire life, would you read it to the end?" Post Hogwarts, multi-chapter fic, slow-burn, eventual Dramione but there's lots of story before then.
1. Muggles, books and blondes

**Hey guys,**

 **This is dedicated to my friend Elena who kick-started my train of inspiration!**

 **It's literally just how it sounds in the description. Hope you enjoy it!**

* * *

She sat down with a contented flop onto the garden chair, placing her shoulder bag down on the ground next to her.

Hermione was exhausted; after a long day of working at the ministry and seeing very few results, she had reached the end of her tether. Even though she did work at the ministry, it wasn't paid, and had barely any influence; it was a small internship in the _Department of the Regulation and Control of Magical Creatures._ Despite her work in the war and her brief stint with the famous life after it finished, she still had to work hard to make her way up the ministry ladder. Not that this was a problem, it was the way she had always done things, so she just continued as she always did. But this did lead to many exhausted afternoons. She rested her aching shoulders as she slumped into her seat and leaned her head back against the wall behind her.

Hermione was sitting in the back garden of a quaint, little cafe in London. It was currently well into autumn and everywhere around her there were browning leaves on the tree branches and covering the floor with colour. From where she sat, she could see a number of other tables, all with mismatching chairs, arranged together in pairs or threes around a tree which stood in the centre of the small area. From the tree, pieces of fabric were hung to the surrounding walls, giving the garden a homely feel even from the first time someone saw it. On the surrounding walls, various quotes had been written out on numerous pieces of paper, though over time most of the words had began to peel or fall from their positions so that Hermione could no longer recognise more than just a few phrases. But despite their neglected appearance, she felt that this made the cafe all the more endearing, somehow.

She couldn't help the appreciative smile that grew on her face as she looked around the familiar setting.

This cafe was one which Hermione was very familiar with. She had stumbled upon it a few years ago on one of her (far too infrequent) trips into muggle London. And since finishing Hogwarts, she had taken up the habit of coming here every other day to read or write. There were many muggle students who would come each day and do the same thing; order a coffee and sit through the day writing various papers on their laptops.

Hermione felt a certain kinship with them, sitting among the group of students as if she had studied right alongside them. But there was still a barrier she felt she could never overcome separating her from them. When she had first entered the Wizarding world she had felt so out of place amongst this new group of people. Though she shared this magically ability, the culture that surrounded them was so different to her upbringing that she couldn't see herself fitting in. But now as she had been sitting with these students she realised just how alien the muggle world had grown to be. What had once been so familiar in the face of the new was now no longer as much of a part of her as she had once thought.

She couldn't help be conscious of that as she sat among the muggle students. Though, ever the stubborn woman that she was, she decided to ignore that completely and continue her usual visits as if she was no different to anyone else.

Today, however, the cafe was fairly empty. There had been a few students in the main room of the cafe, as there usually was, but stepping out into the back garden, she was met with none of the usual faces; only empty seats. Not that this bothered her at all, she sometimes liked the quiet, it allowed her to regain her strength in her solace.

She sighed, opening her eyes after having let them close for a moment, and looked up once more at the space around her.

Everything was as it usually was. The mismatched chairs sat in their usual positions; the small pots full of salt and sugar sat in the centre of each table waiting for the next customers; and the familiar cream fabric still hung over the whole scene.

The only thing Hermione saw which was different was a book. It sat on a nearby table and she wondered why she didn't notice it earlier as she had walked to her chair. It looked very new, like it was just out of print, without even a single crease in the spine – Hermione couldn't help thinking that the owner couldn't have been excited about it if they forgot it in a cafe after never even opening it in the first place. Still, the bookworm in her had become curious, so leaving her bags by her chair she got up and moved towards it.

It was a hardback book, the kind which reminded Hermione of large bookshelves, old libraries and second hand bookshops. The front and back covers were covered in a rough fabric of matted red, devoid of any writing at all, making it look remarkably plain. This however, was not at all true of the spine. The red of the fabric was covered completely by a multitude of intricate patterns. There was gold threading, which began at each corner of the spine, with its pattern dancing across the fabric in complicated image of swirls and shapes; twisting with other silvers, greens and a rich dark blue.

Hermione thought the casing of the book was beautiful, so upon arriving at the table, she reached out and picked it up, appreciating the artwork as she twisted it in her hands.

Having no idea which cover was the front, due to the lack of any writing on either side, Hermione chose one cover at random, opening it up to reveal the text beyond. She was instantly greeted by a page of text which began at the top and ended half way down the page.

Some words near the end caught her eye, and despite her usual aversion to spoiling an ending, she read it.

– _had grown wrinkled, as time had aged them both. Still she knew it had been a life well lived; one of adventure and friendship, of love and loyalty, of hope, faith and trust. And in the end as she closed her eyes for the final time, she knew that even through all she had suffered, she had lived a life; not one of mediocre standards, but an epic tale - a story well written._

She hummed in consideration, before turning to the beginning of the book and opening the first page. The paper, as it was at the back of the book, was a pleasant cream colour and Hermione's eyes were instantly drawn to the title, _The Art of Adventurous Living,_ which was written alone on the page. She flicked to the next page, absently noticing the lack of both an author's note and a dedication, and began to read the first chapter.

 _It all started on an ordinary Wednesday. Ordinary in the fact that, for most, it was neither a memorable day nor a holiday. This Wednesday was simply one of the four Wednesdays in September. Rumours have it that the nineteenth of September was the beginning of a long chain of celebrity scandals, but for most this day passed much the same as any of the others._

 _Its inconsequentiality was not felt by all, however. For one set of parents, it was the climax of all they had said, done and felt for the past 9 months. After their long wait and everything that came with it, their daughter was finally born._

 _The mother, at that time, had been taking a break from her work as dentist in order to retain her strength and prepare herself for the child's arrival. But despite these expectations from all those around her, she took it upon herself to keep herself busy rather than listen to the advice of others and remain in her home feeling restless. It was this rebellious streak that kept her far from where she needed to be when the time came for her child. She, upon beginning her maternity leave, had become determined to learn a new skill. With a flick of her eyes to a pot which sat on her mantelpiece, she decided right there that she would learn to create pottery._

 _This, of course, became more difficult as her pregnancy developed, but in spite of this, every other day she would take a cab across the city to the house of a friendly potter to learn all that she could._

 _This was where she was when her water broke and she went into labour; half a city away from the hospital which had been expecting them._

 _As opposed to the mother, the new child's father was more of the sensible sort. He had just as much of a head on his shoulders as his wife, but he preferred to keep his knowledge to his books rather than travel the world in search of everything unknown; this was more of his wife's frame of mind._

 _He had first trained, then worked as a dentist his whole life, and had become very comfortable in that position. In his spare time he stayed in his library, loving the immersion the environment provided and the knowledge one could gain from the search. He inspired to know rather than discover, and in this he was perfectly content._

 _He was given a few weeks off work around the time of the pregnancy, so on the nineteenth of September, rather than working, he had been shopping. He was finishing up on stocking the room, which would become the child's bedroom, with everything it needed. He had been out of the house for a number of hours, which had given his wife the chance to travel this city to follow her current passion._

 _However, despite the troubles in locating each other and travelling to the same hospital before the whole procedure started, the baby was still born; a young girl of seven pounds and a faint smattering of dark hair._

 _Despite the differences in their preferred lifestyles and ways of tackling life's challenges, both parents had come to agreement on their child's name._

 _And so, on that day, young Hermione Jean Granger was born._

* * *

Whatever Hermione had been expecting, it wasn't that.

She got a nervous wiggling in the pit of her stomach, easily remembering tom riddles diary. She initially had felt a moment of intrigue, but the weariness the war had taught her kicked in just as quickly. When magic was involved you could never be too cautious, and while the war had finished by now, she couldn't help but sit up straighter as nerves slipped into her thoughts, the adrenalin already kicking in.

She eagerly flipped a few pages to continue reading, only sticking on one page for a few lines before moving forward. She caught glimpses of her childhood; the time she broke her leg when she was eleven, when she read her first book in her father's library and when she almost sat on a candle when she was 6.

At each anecdote she read her nerves wound even more tightly. She absently noticed the pages moving quickly as her hands shook, but she couldn't take her eyes off the pages. There were lines upon lines, paragraphs upon paragraphs, depicting her whole life in more detail than she could even remember it. She briefly considered the safety of herself and her family, how this could possibly have been left in this cafe for her to see, and how so much information could fit in a book of such an ordinary size, but each revelation of what this meant stopped her from focusing on each of these concerns individually.

Quickly, as if her life depended on it, she flicked through the book until it reached her current age; slowing as she approached the current day, then started reading once more.

" _That loathsome, irritating, flee-ridden, insolent-" She muttered as she ruffled the papers in front of her, trying to organise them into a neat stack._

" _What's that you're mumbling, Granger?" came the derisive snarl of her boss who had just approached her desk and sat down on the chair beside it._

 _Mr Coughstein. A rather unimportant man in the general scheme of things, but currently one who ran his own department in the ministry and acted as if he lived to irritate his colleagues, at least that was what Hermione thought. She detested him for it._

" _Are you complaining about your position here? You think you can do better in a higher spot? Tell me you could do better than me, I_ dare _you"._

 _It took everything she had for Hermione to stop herself from raising to the bait. She watched as he lifted his feet and rested them atop her desk, the mud from his boots smudging on some parchment which she had just finished writing on._

" _I was just lost in thought, Sir" She said calmly, lying through her teeth. "I was merely thinking about someone I spoke to a few nights ago, I meant no disrespect." She bit her tongue to prevent herself saying any more, faux-polite or not._

" _Let's hope not" He said as he rearranged his feet, dislodging yet another clump of mud which proceeded to fall onto her, now soiled, piece of writing. "The ministry is for official business, if you have a problem with how I run this division perhaps you should take yourself and your complaints elsewhere."_

 _She gripped the edge of her seat in an effort to keep her composure. "No problems, Sir"_

" _Good, I'm glad to hear that, and you better have that report ready on that stupid Elf case, I just need some paper to file so I can get the bloody thing out of my hair. I'm sick of these useless cases."_

 _Hermione looked at the now dirty pages which she had spent hours writing._

Incident report: The abuse and murder of Kalpie – house elf of Mr Trevors and Ms Southerly.

 _Most of the writing now had muck obscuring the words, but she refused to let him see he had affected her or her work, so she kept her complaints to herself._

" _Yes, Sir"._

Hermione almost growled low in her throat as she remembered her boss. But she refused to let herself get distracted, and kept flicking until she got to a few hours later.

 _She sank into her chair, admiring the now familiar walls of the cafe garden which surrounded her. All was as it usually was, except for one book which sat alone on a nearby table..._

 _She turned the book in her hands before opening it..._

 _Hastily, with shaky hands, she read. Each new sentence making the worry more concrete, her nerves evolving into panic..._

'This is now' Hermione thought. She vaguely noticed that she had sat down on a nearby chair, leaving her bag and books carelessly on the other side of the garden, but it didn't matter. Her heart was beating irregularly in her chest, so loudly, in fact, that she could hear it in her ears. She started to feel a little claustrophobic in her skin, her torso hanging weirdly from her shoulders.

"Okay" She said to herself, "Calm down, you've got to check it, see if it's right, no need to freak out unless you fully understand what it is you're seeing."

She read forwards a few lines, hanging on each and every word.

 _Hermione was disrupted by the sound of footsteps coming from inside the main building of the cafe, and as she looked up she saw a small girl with short blond hair entering the garden._

" _Are you okay?" The girl said as she saw Hermione, her brown eyes widening in surprise. "You look like you've seen a ghost"._

" _Oh" Hermione said, coughing as she tried to regain her composure, "No, I'm fine"_

Hermione looked up towards the door expectantly, the hallway standing resolutely empty. She tapped her fingers nervously on the pages, ignoring the way they began to crinkle under her fidgeting. A minute passed, and nothing changed, the only sounds being those of the wind blowing through the trees and the birds which sat on their branches.

She finally looked away, back at the last few pages of the book, checking for any mistakes. 'The book may not be perfect', she thought, 'If this girl doesn't appear, there must be other mistakes too'.

She read and reread, flicking through the endless pages of what she was beginning to see as her autobiography. A surprising smile grew on her face as she stumbled on the account of her first visit to Diagon alley. Her excitement at seeing magic used freely all around her written clearly on the pages. The book spoke about Harry, about their meeting on the train, and how proud she was to have been able to complete her first spell in front of another student. Her nervousness and loneliness during the first few weeks, and the terror of seeing the mountain troll. About the happiness she felt when Harry and Ron began to include her in their lives. All the emotions felt so real, as if she experienced them all again as she read.

The sounds of footfalls dragged her out of the immersion and her nervousness, which had previously faded, came back in full force. Hermione looked up to see one of the girls who often came here to study, her laptop under her arm and her usual backpack hanging behind her. Her large eyes blinked at Hermione in shock, her curly blond her falling around her face.

Hermione almost cried as the foretold words of concern fell out the girl's mouth, "Are you okay? You look like you've seen a ghost".

'If only it was just a ghost', she thought, 'I'm used to those'.

"Oh" She said instead. "No, I'm fine"

"Okay" The other girl, who Hermione thought was called Olive, said."You sure?"

She clearly didn't seem to believe her.

Hermione laughed, trying to diffuse the tension in her ribs, though it sounded remarkably lacking in humour. "Yeah, sorry, I was just stuck in my thoughts for a moment."

The muggle girl nodded in understanding, but smiled reassuringly anyway before sitting down at a nearby table.

'Okay' Hermione thought as she closed the book in her hands, 'I need to figure this out'. She got up, quickly packed her bag and left.

* * *

 **I have so many ideas, so let me know if you want me to continue with it!**

 **For those of you who are interested, this cafe is based on one in Florence that I love to pieces, it's called SitnBreakfast and is just a few minutes' walk from San Lorenzo, it's so cute – recommended.**


	2. Libraries, explanations and cake

**Hello again!**

 **How's that for a quick update? I was in the writing zone this morning and wrote this all out.**

 **Enjoy xox**

* * *

Hermione was focused. She never found herself so in her zone than when she was investigating something, whether it be about a small spell for her homework in first year, or figuring out the downfall of an evil wizard; Hermione liked to research. Discovering new things, and developing her own skills were things she felt called to do.

She was currently sitting in a room she hadn't been in for just over two years; the Hogwarts library.

Being in Hogwarts presented a plethora of memories and emotions which Hermione had been working hard to conquer. But despite the signs of the burnt shelves, the broken bricks and the memories of dead classmates, the Library still provided her with a certain level of comfort. Throughout her schooling, Hermione had taken refuge here most days, for both studying and relaxation, so coming back with this problem reassured her that she'd be able to figure it out.

After leaving the cafe the day before, she had sent an owl to Professor McGonagall who quickly gave her permission to use to school library. So since early that morning she had been working here.

She was currently in the restricted section, sitting on the floor surrounded by a nest of large tombs, unravelled scrolls and pages of her own notes. She had begun by sitting at a table but as her questions increased in number as she read, so did her reference books, so in the end she had to escape one pile of books in order to start another on the floor around her.

The magic involved in creating something like the book she found seemed to be very advanced, and Hermione hadn't ever heard of it happening before. That was the first thing she searched for, she looked through old newspapers, academic papers and books on magic theory, and she had found nothing. No records of fortunetelling books or anything similar.

So, next, she tried to understand the magic.

As of so far, she had established that it must have been a relatively new spell and one formed with multiple intentions. It was a spell which managed to extract the memories and tap into the emotions of the individual on whom the book is focused. It is also able to create endless prose based on these events, and the final, and possibly most intriguing aspect, is its access to future events. Somehow this book was able to read the future is just as much detail as the past.

Hermione had always been very distrustful of divination. 'Seeing into the future' through these magical means was often just a load of tosh. She held no regard for the patterns of some leaves in a cup or the lines on your skin which are merely a product of your genetics; that was how Hermione felt anyway. But somehow, this book had managed to accurately predict a whole exchange, so it would just be stubbornness to ignore what is right in front of her.

And so, with this in mind, she dived into divination theory, not really trusting anything she read but feeling like she should read it anyway. Needless to say, she didn't build on her theories about the book with anything she read about that.

This future aspect of the book was something which Hermione was hesitant to dig into in much detail. The manipulative ability of Tom Riddle's diary, and the way that prophecies have influenced her life so much in the past, made her nervous to read any further. Time and prophetic magic have always been dangerous, especially when messed with, so Hermione decided not to read any further in the book. She didn't want these stories to hold any power over her actions, so, as of yet, she hadn't read anything in the future since that time in the cafe.

This approach did mean, however, that there were few things to research. This didn't bother her too much though, it was all a process, and she would get there in time.

She was flicking through a book on magical transcription when there was a small pattering of young feet accompanied by a small child's giggle. Hermione put her finger down on the line she was reading and looked up towards the sound.

Coming round one of the stacks towards where she sat was a small Ravenclaw. The young girl was swamped in robes which hung heavily over her small frame, but she wore the largest smile Hermione had seen in a long time. She had straight blond hair that was cut to her shoulders and a full fringe which reached to just above her blue eyes.

The girls arm was holding onto something behind her which Hermione couldn't yet see, but as she kept walking another child emerged. This child was a boy, with the same blue eyes and round face, the same baggy robes, only with the yellow of a Hufflepuff tie hanging from his robes. Looking at the two students, Hermione would bet anything that they were twins.

The large smile on the girl's face, and the matching one on her brother's, instantly froze as they saw Hermione sitting there. These children looked to be only 11, and Hermione instantly became conscious of how she was far too old to be in this environment, a 20 year old woman sitting amongst piles of books in a library for students the age of these two small children.

She tried for a small smile despite how uncomfortable she was now beginning to feel.

The eyes of both the little Ravenclaw and the Hufflepuff began to widen and they looked at each other in shock before the girl spoke.

"Are you Hermione Granger?"

Hermione was a little surprised. She didn't know why that was exactly, she was often recognised, but perhaps it was just because of the setting. Once she had entered the school it was like she had fallen back into her life before the war, when she was just a studious nobody who happened to be friends with the chosen one. But seeing the look of these children's faces, like they had seen a celebrity, it brought the rest of her life back into focus.

She smiled back up at them, "Yeah, that's me. Can I help you find anything?"

The Ravenclaw girl wore an excited expression which warmed Hermione's heart.

"Well", the girl said, "There are a few things..."

* * *

"Okay" She said, placing the book, which she now sometimes referred to as _the future book_ , down on the table in front of her. "I have some stuff to tell you guys."

Hermione had been researching for hours the day before, but all the theories, spells and questions were floating messily through her thoughts, preventing any substantial headway. But as she had found during her time at school, the easiest way for Hermione to think through everything was to explain it to someone else. When studying for her classes she had had to explain the content to others in the class, to Harry and Ron, or to those she was tutoring, and this method of speaking everything though really helped her. So, because of this, and because of how she could never keep this from her friends anyway, she had decided to tell them.

They currently all stood in the living room of Grimmauld place. Since Harry had moved in here after finishing school, it didn't feel nearly as dreary as it did during the war. A large cleanout and a few licks of paint had brightened it up considerably. While only Harry lived here, many of their friends, especially Hermione, Ron and Ginny, often came to stay or visit regularly. It was a kind of meeting house; a second home for many people.

But currently, it was just the three of them; Ron and Harry stood in front of Hermione, looking at her with perplexed expressions.

It was moments like this when Hermione couldn't help comparing these two men to when they were both 12. They were now both 19; meaning that they were much taller than they were before, and had small traces of stubble on their jaws from where they had forgotten to shave that morning. But looking at the confused expressions on their faces reminded Hermione so much of how they used to look when she tried to explain their homework to them in first year. She had to hold in a laugh at the comparison.

"What is it?" Harry said a little hint of concern in his voice.

"I found this book, which I'm going to call _the future book_ for the purposes of this conversation, in that cafe I told you about."

Ron raised an eyebrow as if to say 'why on earth are you making such a big deal about a book', before leaning forward to pick it up, twisting it in his hands as he looked at it.

"And?"

She sighed; this bit is more difficult to explain. She reached for the book, opening it to the first page after Ron had passed it.

"What's wrong with it, Hermione?" Harry said, looking a little more worried than Ron did.

The title on the first page was written just as before, and she held up the book to let the boys read it, before turning to the next pages talking as she did.

"'What's wrong' is that this book is a story of my life." She didn't pause for even a second before continuing, not wanting the boys to interrupt her with questions before she had said more. "It has my whole history; the day I was born and everything that happened as I grew up; the time I went with my parents to France; the day I got my letter; all that stuff in school with the basilisk and the time turner and with Sirius-"

She paused there as they all grew solemn in memory.

"The war, Dumbledore..."

She trailed off.

"You just found it like that?" Ron said, breaking the silence.

She nodded, "It was just on a nearby table, so much personal information, thoughts I had never told anyone. And in muggle London of all places."

The boys were both beginning to look even more worried.

"Wait," Harry said, "So how far does it go? Does it keep writing as stuff happens?"

"That's the strangest part, it has the future too."

At that, the boys were both silent; caught half way between shocked and a kind of excitement which comes from having an opportunity like this.

"I haven't read much of it, before you ask. I accidently opened it to the last paragraph when I first read it, but apart from that and a little when I was testing if it worked, I haven't read into the future."

Ron looks up curious, "Wait, so how did the book end?"

"I think I read about when I die," she said as she thought back, "I think I was old and I died in my sleep... or I will die in my sleep. I'm still getting used to this whole 'my life is already determined' thing."

Harry laughed, "I know what you mean".

Ron held out his hand, "Can I have another look?"

She held the book out to him, "Sure, but I think it might be dangerous to read the future stuff..."

Ron sent her a look of fond annoyance, "But that's the best part"

"I know, I know, but remember Tom Riddle's diary? And actually think about how much of an invasion of privacy the Marauder's Map was, this is so much worse than that. Not to mention, I'm so done with Prophecies, aren't you?"

Harry nodded in agreement, though he didn't look like he was happy about not reading it.

"Anyway, I found this the day before yesterday, and yesterday I went to the Hogwarts library to research..." Ron and Harry shared a grin, "...but I found frustratingly little. It probably involves a lot of complex magic-"

"Hey Hermione..." Ron interrupted. He was holding the book open in his hands, with the page open to the back; Hermione could vaguely see a length of text that stopped about two thirds of the way down the page.

"I know you said you shouldn't read the future, but I never agreed to that..." He looked a little sheepish.

"Ron?" She said warningly.

"And you'd read the last page anyway..." He said, trying to justify himself.

Hermione looked at him disapprovingly.

"But I think I figured out something important."

She and Harry looked at him questioningly.

"You said that you die in your sleep when you're old, right?" At Hermione's nod he began to look a little worried.

"What is it?" Harry said, leaning to look at the page Ron held the book open at. "Oh".

"What?" Hermione asked, moving forward to look at the book just as the boys had, what she read confused her all over again.

 _As she looked up into his eyes she saw the tears that glistened in them, his red hair falling messily over his face as he cupped a hand around her cheek. His words of love and reassurance fell on deaf ears as her consciousness began to slip away from her; the lights blurring and the sounds fading into nothing. Her eyes now stared blankly, lifelessly into the world, as she breathed out for the last time. A life worth so much, able to do so much, yet taken roughly from the world much too young; leaving behind not comedy or joy, but tragedy instead. A life of happiness, love and far too much loss, the only question left being, 'what happens next?'"_

"But..." Hermione muttered, "It was so different..."

All three of them shared a confused look.

Hermione shook out her head as if to clear the confused thoughts from her mind, and stepped away from the book, pacing the room as she tried to make sense of it all.

"So", she said, speaking to the room rather than the boys, who remained in their positions reading sections from the book, often muttering to each other when they read something interesting. "Firstly, we know that the future in the book can change, it is not set in stone, so we should not assume that anything written about the future is unavoidable."

She thought back to how what she had read in the cafe had taken place as it was written. "However, as I saw in the conversation in the cafe, if no action is taken to avoid it, the future may turn out the way it is written. So perhaps this is just one possible future, but should I do things that are not in the book's version of events then the future will change."

She stopped pacing when she nearly stubbed her toe on a nearby chair and chose to sit in it instead, fidgeting with her fingers in her lap while she thought. "So, something I had done since getting the book has changed the future written there."

They were disrupted by the sound of the front door opening roughly and the thumps of footsteps coming down the hall. Various crashes could be heard as items which had previous stood on tables or against the walls fell down as they were knocked over. The immediate door was finally opened as Ginny, laden with a broom and multiple bags of kit almost fell into the room. Her long red hair was messily tied back, but completely sodden from the rain which had fallen throughout the day. She wore her Quidditch uniform which now had muddy patches and grass stains on it, presumably from today's practice.

"Harry" she said as she walked in, clearly not noticing anyone else, "Have you got any of that chocolate cake left? I'm really..." She finally looked up to see Hermione and Ron standing there, "Oh, hi everyone."

Harry chuckled, "yeah, I'll go fetch it."

He walked towards the door, kissing Ginny's cheek in greeting as he passed, and went into the kitchen.

"Difficult day, Gin?" Ron asked.

She laughed, "You have no idea, the weather really had it in for us." She walked over to the nearest seat, dropping all her equipment on the way and taking off the top layer of her uniform, before flopping into the seat wearily.

"All I really need is some chocolate, a hot water bottle, and a little bit of rest; I'll be right as rain." She looked at Ron, finally noticing the book in his hands. "Oh hey, nice book. Jones has one that looks just like it, blue rather than red though."

The room went silent as Hermione and Ron shared a meaningful look.

"Huh?" Ginny said in confusion, "What am I missing?"

After a pause, Ron spoke, "Just like this, but blue?"

Ginny nodded.

"Did she say anything about it? How long has she had it?"

Ginny seemed to grow even more confused as the seconds passed. "Nothing, I just saw it, she was writing in it before practice. What's with all the looks and the questions?"

Hermione smiled sheepishly, "It's kind of a long story."

It was at this point that Harry walked in with a hot drink in one hand and a plate of cake in the other. Ginny looked up at him with a huge grin and a loving look in her eyes, Hermione couldn't help feeling a warm glow in her heart as she watched them together.

"You're the best, Harry" Ginny said, taking the mug and plate from his hands gratefully.

"It's true" Harry joked, his grin growing wider than Hermione had seen it that day. He sat down next to her, placing a hand easily on her knee.

"Alright, alright" Ron said, rubbing the back of his neck with his hand awkwardly, making Hermione chuckle. "We were talking about serious stuff, remember."

"Right" Ginny said, turning back to Hermione and Ron, though leaning slightly into Harry's side. "Tell me everything."

* * *

 **Hopefully more to come soon, I'm feeling very inspired.**

 **Let me know what you think,**

 **Blessings xoxo**


	3. Floos, tests and secrets

**Since I last updated this, I lost a** _ **whole**_ _ **page**_ **of notes and ideas about this fic – so annoying - so I don't know quite as much about where this fic is going as I did before. But no matter! I'll get there somehow.**

 **Here's chapter three,**

 **Enjoy!**

* * *

"Can you remember?" Ginny asked.

"Hmm, Diagon Alley I think, that new shop, what's it called?" The female voice paused in thought, humming as she did. " _Scallion's_ _scissors_ or something like that, it's down near the bottom, the same side as Olivander's used to be."

It was the morning after Hermione had told everyone about the book she found, and with all the revelations which had been made the day before, all four young people were waiting with anticipation in the living room in their Pyjamas, watching Ginny as she spoke into the floo. She was currently lying on the floor, her head leaning in the fireplace as she spoke to her fellow Holyhead Harpie, Gwenog Jones. At Jones's words, Ginny looked up at Hermione to gauge her response. Hermione nodded in agreement to Ginny's unspoken question.

"Would you be able to meet me in the leaky cauldron and take me there?" Ginny said into the fireplace, "'cause I'm going to be in town with some friends and I'd love to see the shop."

Hermione could hear a smirk in Jones's voice as she replied,".. your famous friends? ...Famous, bespectacled, boyfriend friends? "

Ginny very visibly rolled her eyes without answering, her cheeks heating a little.

Jones laughed, "It's not important. Sure, I can show you."

Ginny smiled, "Is later today alright? Around 11 or something."

"Sure" Jones said as she disconnected her floo, leaving Ginny, Hermione, Harry and Ron to themselves.

Despite there being many seats in the living room of Grimauld place, some which Hemione herself had charmed to be extremely comfortable, it seemed that the three spectators always found standing to be preferable when in a strange situation. Upon noticing this, Hermione wondered if perhaps they had all become so used to having to run in stressful situations, so they automatically stood in order to be ready for that. She made sure to sit down, reminding herself there was no danger, and expecting it was a habit she was _going_ to break.

She fiddled with her hands restlessly.

Ron looked between Ginny and Hermione, remembering the conversation in the floo, "What was that look? Why is it so important that we meet her in person?"

Hermione forced her fingers to stop fiddling, and Ron narrowed his eyes at her.

On hearing the question Harry's eyebrows drew together for a moment, until he seemed to have figured it out. "You don't suspect her do you?"

Hermione shifted awkwardly, sighing, "Not really, she's just the only other person who has seen a book like this one, so we need to make sure we know as much as we can."

Ginny nodded, tightening her dressing gown around her as she stood up, and covering her mouth while she yawned.

"Okay, I'm going back to sleep for a bit. No one should be up this early when there isn't practice." The end of her sentence was muffled as she fell victim to another yawn. She walked past Harry on her way out, who gently touched her shoulder in comfort. She smiled up at him sleepily, and made her way out the living room; the sound of her feet going up the staircase being heard by the three left behind.

Harry wore a small dopey smile on his face for a few minutes afterwards and Hermione laughed slightly under her breath.

* * *

She sat in the library about half an hour later, leaning over a table and writing up her thoughts. The _future book_ lay closed to her left, and she tried as best as she could to just ignore it's presence until she had made sufficient progress in what she was doing, but her curiosity really could not be hampered.

She had tried to persuade herself that she wanted her choices to be her own, and didn't want her future to be governed by how she wanted the ending to look; but resisting the opportunity to test the book was just too difficult. It had been beside her bed all night, taunting her as she tried to ignore it in order to fall asleep; but now she gave in.

Hermione cleaned her quill with a flick of her wand so that the ink would not spread when she put it on the table, then she tidied up her papers, leaving everything in a neat pile. She reached over and picked up the book once more, appreciating the covers as she opened to the first page.

 _The Art of Adventurous Living_

It looked exactly the same as before, and as she turned the page the book started identically, _no changes here_ , she thought. Continuing in her search, she flicked through to the time in the cafe when she found the book, and saw everything progress as it had been written and how it had played out. She continued, turning the pages which showed when she had apparated to Hogwarts, the time she spent with the Ravenclaw and Hufflepuff twins, and last night as the four of them spoke, explaining what had happened and discussing what they should do about it; deciding that the first point of call would be Jones and the book shop.

She continued flicking until the current moment, and found the beginning of a paragraph and began to read what the words wrote was to come.

 _As was often the case in Hermione's life, her mind and her heart would get lost in a book. Whether it was fiction or nonfiction was of little consequence, as the immersion of words and the development of knowledge was, to Hermione, one of life's greatest pleasures._

 _So, as usual, the reason Hermione was brought out of her stint of reading was due to an interruption by one of her friends, and in this case it was Harry. She had not heard the sound of his feet walking down the hallway, or his quiet chatter with his girlfriend as they split at the top of the stairs; Ginny going towards the kitchen and Harry going towards the library. It was only when the soft tap of his knuckles sounded from the open door frame that she looked up away from her current page._

Hermione purposefully pulled herself out of the pages and listened for the sound of footsteps in the hallway. She heard none so far, but acting on impulse and the desire to beat the book, she cast a quick disillusionment charm on herself and placed the book open on the table in front of her, hiding herself from sight before setting back into reading.

" _Harry?" She asked, "Everything okay?"_

 _He smiled familiarly at her as he walked into the room, heading for the seat beside her._

" _Yeah, I kind of want your help with something though, do you have a minute?"_

 _Hermione easily lay down the book, letting it shut on the table in front of her. "Of course, what is it?" She said, a little concerned._

 _Harry must have noticed it in her expression, because he eagerly spoke to dispel her worries._

" _No, no, nothing bad, don't worry." He reached into the pocket of the green hoodie he wore, and once it was clear that his hand had gripped onto something, he started to look a little nervous. "Just, err.."_

 _He said nothing more, but brought out a small box from his pocket and handed it to Hermione with a strange expression on his face, somehow looking both sheepish and extremely happy._

 _She brought her eyebrows together in confusion, taking the box from his outstretched hand, and prying open the small lid, to reveal a beautiful engagement ring, facing outwards from within a red piece of fabric. Hermione's confusion was gone instantly._

" _Harry!" She said excitedly, looking to see his response, "Woah! When are you going to ask her?"_

 _She noticed him looking nervously towards the door, obviously worried that Ginny might overhear, so she made sure to lower the volume of her voice._

" _Sorry" She said a little quieter now, "but this is incredible!"_

 _His face split out in a large grin, "Thanks, I don't know, to be honest. Do you think she'll like it?"_

Hermione was brought out of the conversation by the sound of Harry speaking to Ginny by the stairs, before he started walking along the corridor on his way to the library.

Continuing her actions a few minutes ago, she hastily disillusioned the book too, and sat silently to see what would come to pass.

Harry knocked on the doorframe of the library, turning his head both ways, checking all the various seating areas, evidently searching for her.

Confusion grew on his face, and Hermione noticed him tapping the left pocket of his hoodie, where she knew the ring to be, as he thought. She instantly felt a little guilty, making a mental note to find an opportunity for him to have the conversation with her another time. This test was important though.

"Hermione?" He called out, "You here?"

He looked towards the table she was sitting at, his eyes picking out the pieces of paper and quill which she had left visible, and started to walk over. His expression grew more and more worried, and Hermione finally couldn't take it, flicking her wand to make herself visible again.

"Woah!" Harry blinked in shook, "What the hell?"

She let the guilt show on her face, "I'm sorry, Harry, I just wanted to check something".

He looked at her a little uncertainly but nodded, "Like what?"

"Well", she said, flicking her wand to lift the charm on the book too. "I have discovered that the book's future isn't perfect, It doesn't definitely know how the future will happen, it just gives one possible version of events. See..." she said, moving the open book along the desk, so it was in front of him as he sat on the sofa beside her. "it said you were going to come talk to me, so I disillusioned myself to see if I could avoid the future it foretold. Which I did, as the conversation we were going to have was different.." She trailed off, feeling sorry that he hasn't going to be able to tell her his news himself.

He was quiet for a second, "Wait... so, you know what I was going to talk to you about?"

She nodded.

It was a nerve-wracking silence for her, but to Hermione's complete surprise, he actually grinned, "Okay, I was kind of nervous about saying it, so this makes it easier"

She laughed, a little shocked, "Nervous about telling me? How about telling her?"

He grinned, "Absolutely bricking it."

She laughed loudly, placing a hand on his shoulder to give her support, before bringing the topic back to her conclusions.

"So, yes, the future in the book is avoidable, it can be changed, so we need not worry too much about what it says will come of us, because there is a large chance that it won't happen exactly how it describes it anyway."

Harry nodded, still smiling and looking quite pleased, to Hermione's immense relief. After a minute of quiet though, Harry broke the silence.

"But then, when does the book change?" He asked.

"What?" she said.

"The book, everything in the past is correct, right?" So when does the prediction get changed to the correct version?"

Hermione, considered this, "That's a good point, actually. I don't know" They both looked to the book, watching the pages to see if the conversation and jokes they would have had would disappear. But nothing changed at all, the future which was no longer taking place was still written there.

Hermione hummed in consideration, "Perhaps.."

She lifted the book up, placing a small piece of parchment between the pages and closed the book, waiting for a second before opening it once again. They both eagerly started reading the page.

 _Harry must have noticed it in her expression, because he eagerly spoke to dispel her worries._

" _No, no, nothing bad, don't worry." He reached into the pocket of the green hoodie..._

"No" Harry said, "it's still the same, maybe without the parchment?"

Hermione agreed, taking the parchment out and closing the book. This time, as she opened it, new words were written; ones that spoke of disillusionment charms, confusion and experiments.

"There! So it's when you close the book." She said.

"Yeah" Harry agreed. He sat back in the sofa, lost in his thoughts while Hermione picked up the book again, reading past the current time, into future events.

She began to smile as she read what she was might be about to say, thinking that it was actually a good idea.

"So, according to this we have about ten minutes before Ginny comes to speak to us, can I see that ring in real life before she does?"

* * *

 **Sorry I took so long to write this, and it's so short, but thank you all so much for your encouragement (especially the guest who reviewed yesterday! Thank you!)**

 **Blessings xox**


	4. Conversations, onions and thieves

**Here's the next instalment, quite a bit longer than my previous one. You have no idea how many cups of tea got cold as I got sucked into writing this.**

 **I'm not sure how happy I am with it, but I hope you enjoy it!**

* * *

The Leaky Cauldron hadn't faired too badly during the war. The pub stood with the same dingy colouring and familiar furniture as it did before, though with the larger amount customers sitting at the tables it was a lot more welcoming than it had been in the height of Voldemort's return. Hermione and Ron sat at a table along the front wall of the pub, sitting across the table from each other, both looking out the window in thought.

The window faced a muggle street in London, one which Hermione had become very familiar with during her visits to Diagon Alley. She remembered the first time Professor McGonagall took her through into Wizarding London. She was only young, and to her, magic so far had been incredible, but mostly in a way which seemed like lots of tricks.

When the professor first arrived at her house she had been shown things like a cup being transfigured into a shoe, or a wand being able to produce puffs of smoke or levitate things up in the air. While she was amazed by these things, it had been different when they visited the Leaky Cauldron for the first time. To a muggle, the front of the pub appeared as just a facade, a front to a run-down building that was not still in use. But upon walking in, she saw that this wasn't true at all. Magic then became not just some extra tricks which she could study, but showed a whole other world which she had not been able to see; she saw that her perception before had been so limited, and the world was so much more than she had previously thought.

Having a misleading charm on a building was no longer the most advanced magic she had seen, or used for that matter; but looking back on that day, she still felt so warm at the memory of the world completely opening up to her.

Ron who sat across from her must have had an entirely different experience, Hermione thought. Having come from an old magical family, he must have focused on different things, seen different people.

Ron stopped looking out the window and looked across at her, his eyes picking up where she was absentmindedly fiddling with the cover of the book which she had on the chair next to her with the rest of her stuff. His eyes were clearly focused on a certain thought which was bouncing around his mind, his mouth set a little in concentration, opening slightly at various moments as if he were about to speak but changing his mind.

"What is it?" she asked.

He blinked, evidently shocked by her abrupt question. "Oh" he said, "Well there is something I want to talk to you about actually"

She felt a little nervous. When there was something he just fancied discussing he would usually come out with it quickly, this felt a little ominous.

"Oh?"

He nodded, but his gaze kept moving around from her to other areas in the room, never staying still for long.

Hermione remembered that back in her school days before the war, Ron had been much more confident and brash when it came to speaking his mind. There was very little which made him quieten, in fact, she couldn't remember an instance where that had happened before the last few years of school when he spoke to her. Sometimes he may have gotten so angry that physically stopping himself speaking was the only way to not explode, but she rarely saw him hold something in because he was nervous. Growing up through a war must have really done something, Hermione thought. He'd changed quite a lot since school, and it was really starting to show; not that he had lost his sense of humour, or his temper, because that often liked to show itself and remind everyone of its presence.

"It's about the book actually" he said now. "I've been thinking, for a while actually... Well, you remember the last page of the book from when I read it before? I don't know if it's changed or anything"

Hermione had a feeling that she knew where this was going. She'd been thinking of that phrase since she read it.

 _As she looked up into his eyes she saw the tears that glistened in them, his red hair falling messily over his face as he cupped a hand around her cheek. His words of love and reassurance fell on deaf ears as her consciousness began to slip away from her..._

It's not like she never wanted anything with him. In fact, she used to want it a lot. Looking back, she remembered how much everything with Lavender had hurt her. But now that they were about to have a conversation about it, she didn't feel particularly emotive about it. It's not that she disliked the idea; In fact if he asked her out somewhere, she didn't think she would say no. But for some reason it didn't have the same sense of anticipation and excitement that it would have had a few years ago.

Quite unsure of what she was feeling, she decided to be completely neutral.

"Yeah, I remember" She made sure to smile, so he wouldn't think that she was trying to shut him down or spite him at all before she continued. "I don't think we should let what is written in the book influence out lives."

She looked out the window trying to ignore the way his face fell slightly. Guilt churned in her stomach. _Leading him on if you don't really want it would be crueller_ , she reminded herself.

After a moment, she looked back to see Ron nodding in understanding, if a little reluctantly, "No, you're right" he said, "Divination shouldn't be the reason it starts."

She smiled half-heartedly, "Yeah".

It was at that moment that Harry and Ginny returned, and Hermione could not have been more grateful. Ginny was walking in front as they weaved between the chairs, her red hair flowing over her casual robes. Harry, who was holding on to her hand as he followed her, wore a small but nonetheless bright smile as he looked at his girlfriend in front of him.

"Guess who we ran into" Ginny grinned.

Jones, who was following the couple a few steps behind, rolled her eyes, "Very surprising, I know"

Gwenog Jones was at least 10 years older than the others present, but held herself and moved with a kind of youth which rivalled everyone else's. She was tall, dark skinned, and had long dark straight hair which was currently up in a pony tail which fell down her back. Because of the quiddich she played, she was very clearly in shape, and walked with strength and confidence in her broad shoulders and an ever present smirk on her lips.

"Hey Jones" Ron said, grinning up at the new arrival.

She looked across the table at him, "Weasley, right?"

"Yeah" He agreed, "Ron".

She nodded in acknowledgement and then looked across at Hermione.

"Granger... Hermione, that right? I remember you being at one of Slughorn's dos."

"Yes, that's me" She replied, not knowing what else to say. When she had first met her, Hermione had felt like Gwenog was a bit too self-confident, but she didn't seem to be too unpleasant this time, so she forced herself to begin creating a new opinion.

Ginny, who had sat down during the introductions, decided to get the day started. "So, shall we get going?"

* * *

Despite the slight tension between her and Ron after their earlier conversation, and the unfamiliarity she felt about being out with Gwenog, Hermione enjoyed their walk down to the shop. A day out with her friends was just what she had needed after her week at work. She valued the fact she had her job, and what she was hoping to accomplish with it, but the effort of appeasing particularly unpleasant people every day of the week did tend to take it out of her. So she relished in the freedom of the Saturday with her friends.

Gwenog and Ron stood at the front, taking the lead as they walked down the street, bursts of laughing filling the air every so often. Hermione tried not to think too deeply on the complete lack of jealousy she felt at that.

She, Ginny and Harry were following behind, the couple engaged in a comfortable conversation which Hermione wasn't choosing follow; she instead was lost in her thoughts having so much to think about at the moment. With everything from the papers she needed to write for work on Monday; this whole extravaganza with the book, and what that meant; the possibility of Jones being suspicious; and all the stuff with Ron-

An elbow knocked into her ribs.

She blinked herself instantly out of her thoughts and reacted on reflex, grabbing her bag roughly and turning towards the offending.

"Hey-" she began. But once she actually looked what who it was she forced herself to release the tension in her shoulders. It was only a young girl, with long light brown hair hanging messily over her purple robes, her fringe falling over her anxious expression.

"I'm so sorry, miss!" The girl said hurriedly, "it was an accident!"

Hermione breathed out a silent breath, and smiled at the young witch, "No it's okay. It was my fault. Don't worry".

The girl smiled, still looking a little scared and quickly made her way away, dipping through the crowds towards a shop across the street with distinctive blue windowsills and heading inside. Hermione's eyes followed her go, and only left her once the door shut behind her. It was at this moment that Hermione noticed the more familiar hand tapping her on her other shoulder.

"Hermione?" a concerned voice said.

"Huh?" she said, looking back at Ginny and Harry who were looking at her worriedly. She sighed quietly.

"What was that?" Ginny said kindly, gesturing to Hermione herself.

She then noticed quite how she was standing. Her arms and legs were tense, one arm holding her bag protectively and the other covering her wand where it was concealed on the other wrist. She forced her legs to flex slightly and stand casually, and released the tension in her shoulders.

"I've just been a little jumpy recently" She admitted.

Ginny frowned.

Hermione smiled at her, genuinely appreciative of the concern but a bit uncomfortable with it being focused on her. "I'm fine, Ginny, don't worry"

Her friend maintained her gaze for a second but with a nod started walking again.

Jones and Ron, who hadn't noticed the incident and were now considerably further down the street, looked back to check on them a minute later and noticed the change.

"You guys alright?" Ron called back, stopping to wait for them to catch up with Jones at his side.

"Yeah" Harry replied, "I think a shop over there painted their sills blue, did you notice? That's new, isn't it?"

Ron raised an eyebrow, clearly not buying the topic choice completely, but he went along with it anyway. "I didn't notice. Which shop?"

Ginny answered him, "I don't think it's open yet, new one".

He nodded in acknowledgement. As the three of them got closer, Ron's eyes, as they seemed to do fairly often these days, instantly went to Hermione and a flicker of concern crossed his face. He didn't say anything at this time, but as they kept walking and Ginny struck up a conversation with Jones, Ron waited back by Hermione's side.

"Hey" He said fairly quietly, reaching for her hand which she just noticed was still clenched at her side. He pulled gently at her fingers to unclench it. "What's up?"

It's not that it was irritating that her friends cared about her wellbeing, not at all; she did and always would do the same for them. But she felt embarrassed, as if she needed emotional support when someone in the street bumped into her. It made her feel weak, and that was not a feeling she liked at all, especially having gone through everything she did.

She pulled her hand out of his and held onto the strap of her bag to give it something to do.

"Yeah" She answered him honestly, "I'm fine, just a little jumpy".

He nodded, and thankfully, let it go.

They walked on without speaking, just drinking in the area and the happy sounds of the wizarding community around them. Ahead of them, Ginny and Jones were talking animatedly easy smiles on their faces, and Harry was walking separate from both pairs, looking just as comfortable as she felt walking in a stress-free, and more importantly, war-free time. The peace that came with that still felt incredible even though the war had finished over two years ago.

"Hermione" Ginny called from in front of her. "Look, this is the book I was telling you about, beautiful isn't it?"

Ginny was holding Jones' book showing the blue fabric of the front cover. Just as her book was, this one was truly beautiful; the intricate stitching on the spine covering the blue fabric in silver, green and magenta. Hermione probably would have appreciated it more, however, if she wasn't aware that it could be yet another sneaky, mind reading, fortune teller.

"It is!" She tried to be casual as she attempted to see what was written inside. "Is the paper inside nice quality too? I can't count the number of times I've seen a beautiful cover but the paper inside is thin and leaves imprints half way through the book when I start writing".

Jones smiled and nodded, taking back the book back from Ginny and putting it back in her bag easily, "Yeah, I know what you mean, but this one's great".

Hermione nodded, her thoughts rushing through her mind as she put things together.

They had walked almost to the end of Diagon Alley by now, and Jones turned the group towards the right side of the street, indicating to one of the buildings there were approaching.

After the war, most of the buildings on the street needed to be redone; especially the most famous like Olivander's which was almost completely destroyed in an effort to scare the community. But at the end of the street where Scallions Scissors sat, the buildings, while needing at least a little repair, could have been worse off.

This previous damage, however, was no longer obvious at all at this shop. Whoever had taken to remaking it had done a marvellous job, Hermione thought. The windows were fixed and clean; the dark wood of the sills, the door and its frame were free from splinters and burn; and the large sign above it all was beautiful with freshly painted decoration. The words _Scallions Scissors_ were written in Italics with green and gold patterns swirling behind them What caught Hermione's eye most, however, was that the whole sign was surrounded by a darker boarder which seemed to morph from dark shades of greens to browns and blues as Hermione watched it.

Jones led the group inside, and despite the reason for her coming into the shop, Hermione found that she really was delighted to be there.

The inside of the shop was just as pristine as the outside. There were numerous counters and shelves holding a variety of books, equipment and a few plants as well. Along the wall to her left was a shelf devoted solely to quills of different shapes, styles and origins; and along the far wall was a ceiling high bookshelf filled with both wizard and muggle literature and academia; a genuine smile flourished on Hermione's face.

To her right stood a wooden table, which was quite clearly the counter, but it was currently unmanned. The table top was littered with various notebooks with scratchy writing and diagrams written in them. Around them there were various knickknacks and a large mug of cold tea which looked to have some kind of onion floating in it. Around the edge of the table there were little potted plants with strange and seemingly sentient plants moving in them. One plant had long, thin, dark purple leaves, which twirled around from the stem like the hands of an Indian dancer. Hermione also noticed what looked like a biro pen and a couple of pencils and an eraser sticking out of the soil in the pot too, which was strange for a number of reasons.

The whole shop wore a certain aesthetic which Hermione found so interesting to look at, and she continued round the room, looking at all the strange and wonderful things she found.

"Beautiful" She muttered absently, her fingers trailing over the spines of some herbology books along the back wall.

"Why thank you, my dear!" replied a strongly accented voice from Hermione's right; she quickly turned towards it.

Behind the previously unmanned counter stood a middle aged man. His thin hair sat combed neatly on his round head, and he stood unassumingly with his arms down at his sides. He wore a green waistcoat over a baggy shirt which made him look remarkably like a farmer.

"You're welcome" Hermione said, "Do you own this shop?"

He smiled, hooking his thumbs into the pockets of his jeans, "That I do" He said with unmistakable warmth for his shop in his voice. He then started looking between the members of the group, showing obvious recognition when he saw Harry and Jones.

"And feel free to tell me I'm mad" He continued, "but you lot are famous faces, right?" Hermione, having spent very little time in Norfolk, though enough to recognise that this was where his accent was from, had to think for a second to decipher what he had said.

Ron, who was standing closer to the door looking noticeably less enthralled than Hermione, joined in the conversation at this. "That's us" he smiled.

"Well, I'm happy to meet you all!" The man continued.

Harry, Hermione noticed, was looking quite uncomfortable during this exchange despite how long he had been recognised for before the war. He had turned his head to look towards the far wall, and was now feigning interest in something on the shelves.

She made sure to move the conversation on. "It's lovely to meet you too. I really love this shop; you've done a wonderful job setting it all up."

Ginny, who could see that Hermione was getting a little distracted by the rest of the shop, decided to continue the conversation. "You wouldn't be able to help me would you? Gwen was telling me about a beautiful book she bought here, I was wondering if I can get one too."

"I'm sure you can, my dear" He smiled to Ginny, "I remember the one she bought, in fact. A beauty, I might add."

He quickly cast a warming charm on the mug of strange tea, and carried it with him, taking the a few sips as he led them across the room to the left wall towards the back of the shop. He stood at a tall shelf which was filled with the most extraordinary selection of notebooks, muggle pencils and bookmarks. All of the items were beautifully decorated, colourful and eye-catching; Hermione could have looked through the collection for hours.

But what was most important was the middle shelf which housed the note books. Some had red covers like hers, or blue like Gwenog's, and some others had white, green, or grey; all with spines covered in the twisting patterns of colourful threads.

She reached forward and picked a book up off the shelf. It was almost identical to her own, being covered in the same red fabric and intricate designs, only without the silver thread on the spine. The book looked to be in much better condition, as would be expected, but still recognisably one of the same set.

As she held it, she watched eagerly to see if anything would happen. She opened the cover, wondering if she would see text or perhaps drawings inside, maybe the books worked in different ways.

But she only saw blank pages. There was nothing unusual at all.

This wasn't a bad thing; it just cleared up some questions. The books were not likely created by the same people as those who cast the enchantments; she figured that the spells on her book must have been placed after the creator had bought the book. But making sure she didn't over look anything, she decided to test it quickly.

As she scratched a pretend itch on her wrist as a distraction, she held a finger to where her wand was concealed, subtly casting a non-verbal detection charm to see if there was any hidden writing or enchantments. It came up blank, nothing magical about the book at all.

"All muggle made, you know?" The man said.

Hermione looked at him surprised, _that_ _explains the lack of enchantments_ , she thought. "Oh really?"

He looked proud of himself, "Yeah, found them in a little shop by the Thames, stunning stuff."

"Oh, lovely. Do you go into muggle London often then?" She asked.

"Yeah, it's not quite like the country but I still like it. I'm muggle-born, you know. Haven't heard of any wizarding Middletons, have you?"

Hermione grinned, "I am too, but I'm afraid not, I'll let you know if I do though."

In her mind, as Hermione imagined the kind of people who would spend their time, energy and resources on making a book like this, she pictured Deatheaters or their sympathisers; probably to somehow figure out how to bring back Voldemort or something equally horrific. With so much dangerous information in the book, she didn't feel it was that unlikely. But if this was the case, she decided that someone such as this muggle-born shopkeeper who sold muggle-made products probably wouldn't be working at the forefront of it.

Harry chose this moment to join in the conversation, taking the opportunity to find out more for their investigation. "Do you get many wizards buying these then? Seeing as they're muggle made?"

 _Clever_ , Hermione thought.

"Yeah!" Middleton said, "Why, a couple of weeks back a guy came in and bought nine of them, said he was buying them for some friends he was visiting in France or something"

Hermione could feel Ginny looking at her at this but she made sure to not waver at the news, focusing just on what he was staying.

"That's strange" Harry tried to chuckle casually, "Who was that?"

"Oh, I don't know, I don't take the names of my customers, Mr Potter" He chuckled. "Now didn't you want to buy something?"

Hermione looked up at him, handing him the book in her hands. "Yes, please, I'd quite like this one."

"A beautiful choice, miss!"

Middleton made his way back towards his desk, the onion in his tea bobbing with each step. Hermione went to follow him but she was stopped by Ron's hand on her arm as he got her attention.

"So?" He asked quietly, "What did you find on it?"

She frowned, "nothing actually".

"Huh? " He said confused, "Why did you buy it then?"

"Well, the thing is that the detection charm I used isn't flawless, and the more powerful ones can't be done wandless, so I'll do them when we get back."

Ron nodded, "Oh, okay, well done with that charm too, I hardly noticed you do it"

She chuckled, "Thanks, I was aiming for that".

They rejoined the rest of the group who were standing by the counter as the shopkeeper sat down, hastily moving the larger obstructions from the table and placing Hermione's book at the centre. He then reached below the table and brought out a bottle of some kind of thin green liquid, spraying it onto the strange purple plant Hermione had noticed earlier, before reaching into the pot to take one of the biro pens out of the soil it had been placed in.

"What was that?" Ginny asked curiously as Middleton wiped the soil off the pen on a tissue.

" _Foleniendo_ " he said, "It's a potion. This plant here can be pretty protective of its belongings." He said with a chuckle.

Ginny, who had been standing fairly close to the plant for the past minute looked down to see that the long leaves had managed to wrap round the strap of her bag and reach under the flap. As she watched, one leaf pulled out a pen and was placing it in the soil among its other treasures.

Hermione couldn't help laughing a little at the shock on Ginny's face.

"Bit like a Niffler" He chuckled, "The potion sedates it so you can get your stuff back".

Ron was grinning in amusement, "That's fantastic".

Middleton sprayed the plant with his potion once more to let Ginny retrieve her pen before he got back to work. He opened a scroll of parchment and noted down the date and which book had been bought before readdressing Hermione.

"That'll be 24 sickles, miss."

She paid him and was just putting the new book in her bag when he spoke once more.

"Now we've got all that out the way, I have a question for you" He looked directly at Hermione his expression becoming more serious. "Why'd you cast that non-verbal earlier?"

Only from her practice hiding things during school and on the run did Hermione manage to prevent herself looking shocked. Jones, however, as unaware of their plan as she was, turned instantly towards Hermione with a surprised look on her face saying _What is he talking about?_

She gave small smile and worked quickly to think up a good cover story.

"You can't be too careful." She said looking towards her friends for their approval. She almost smiled as she looked at Harry and Ron to see the trusting looks on their faces which said to go ahead.

She Harry and Ron had been on so many adventures before, and had developed an understanding of how they each worked. It warmed Hermione's heart to have them trust her to make decisions, when so many years ago they had hardly listened to her at all.

"Look, I probably shouldn't be saying any of this, but it's not fair to hide it from you in your own shop" she continued with what she hoped was a genuine voice, "We've been collaborating privately with the ministry" This was only half false as Harry and Ron were both currently aurors. "We knew so much information about the war while we were in it, so it only made sense that we would help with the clean up, you know, catching the remaining death eaters and such."

Hermione noticed Ginny trying her best not to grin at how easily Hermione could fabricate a story, and tried her best to ignore it before she started grinning herself.

"But the war has been over for two years" the man said.

Hermione nodded, "That's true, but some of them have been leading us on quite the goose chase I'm afraid. But anyway, we saw a book like the ones you sell Mr Middleton while we were on assignment, so we came to investigate. I just cast the non-verbal to make sure it was safe. I can't say more than this, I'm sorry. It's important this all stays secret in order to complete the clean up from the war."

The shop keeper no longer looked too suspicious, thankfully, so Hermione didn't need to elaborate from there.

"Right" He said, obviously thinking it through.

Harry took the initiative to dig for more information. "It would be really helpful if you told us who it was that bought those nine books; I know you said you didn't take his name-"

"I didn't lie, Mr Potter, he didn't tell me his name." He looked mildly affronted at the idea, "But I might be able to find out if it really is so important. A friend of mine who was in the shop at the time said he knew him. I could give you his address for an owl?"

"That would be fantastic", Hermione said.

He quickly scribbled some words on a small piece of parchment before handing it to Hermione with a smile.

They thanked him and left; set with the next piece of the puzzle, a new book and a hunger to find some answers.

* * *

 **Sorry about the abrupt ending, but it just wrote itself like that.**

 **Thanks for all the encouragement! It means more than you know!**


	5. Insects, Nuts and Friends

**Here I am again! This one is written a little differently, I hope you still like it.**

* * *

Middleton's friend, who he referred to as Jiminy Cricket though Hermione was 98% sure that wasn't his true name, had been surprisingly cooperative and only three days after their trip to Scallion's Scissors they had the name of a possible lead. Those two days they spent waiting had been fairly uneventful for the group. It seemed strange to Hermione that mere days after making such a momentous find her daily life was continuing so ordinarily; such is life sometimes.

Harry had been the one to write the letter as soon as they got home on the Saturday. They had thought, quite correctly, that if he was the one to write it the response would be more enthusiastic. The whole group had helped phrase it perfectly; ensuring that it contained by respect and authority, all while not making them sound like a group of stalkers. But in the end they managed it and with Harry's endorsement they got a fast reply.

From Hermione's perspective, the only interesting things that happened during those two days could be summarised with two main events; one on the Sunday, and the second on the Monday. Those two events occurred as follows.

* * *

 _Sunday_

Despite the fact she did have a place to stay outside of Grimmauld place, Hermione did not return to it Saturday evening, which meant that Sunday was spent in the company of her three closest friends as both Weasley's chose to do the same thing as her.

It was about three in the afternoon that day when Ginny asked to read some of the future book.

"I won't read far into the future or anything" she promised, "I just want to see Hogwarts, haven't been there in a while"

Now that Hermione had become familiar with the book which was pretty much an extremely detailed and personal autobiography, the panic she had initially felt about such a book existing was receding slightly. Not entirely of course, but she reasoned that if it stayed at Grimmauld Place then no one with bad intentions could take it and abuse the power it could provide. Thus, the fear of it dulled. This gave way to another emotion, mild embarrassment. Not about the fact that the book had been made, as that was out of her hands, but as she read through her teenage years there were detailed accounts of her emotions, her feelings towards others, what she thought and did in the privacy of her own company. She didn't feel like she had anything to be particularly embarrassed about, but the open and unapologetic way it was written out left her feeling particularly exposed.

This was why she was becoming a little hesitant to let others read it. But even as she hesitated she reminded herself that this was Ginny, one of her best friends, and soon to be engaged to another of her best friends, hopefully; she wouldn't judge her for anything.

She smiled, "Sure" and passed her friend the book which had been on the arm rest of the chair she was sitting in.

They were both currently sitting in one of the upstairs bedrooms, ginny on top of the bed with her back against the headboard and her legs laid out in front of her, and Hermione in a nearby arm chair.

This house, having once belonged to a rich, pureblood, wizarding family, was fairly luxurious. It was hard to tell before as it was spoiled by mouldy wall paper and uncomfortably loud portraits, but having cleaned and restyled it they could now see just how stunning it could have been in its prime. The rooms were large and let in a nice about of light despite being on a street, and the rooms were all laid out in the house in a way which somehow felt very elegant.

When they first finished decorating, she and Ginny had decided to spend time in all the rooms, in order to find their favourites. And though this one remained styled as a bedroom, they found that they rather enjoyed sitting in there. There was large window opposite the door letting in the light of the rising sun in the mornings, and a view over the park which sat across the road. The floor was hard wood and the one of the walls was covered by a bookshelf, which of course appealed to Hermione.

So this room was where they found themselves that Sunday afternoon when Harry and Ron arrived home through the floo in the living room.

"Gin?" Harry called, "'Mione?"

"Upstairs!" Ginny called back, not looking up from the book she now had open in her hands.

The footfalls on the stairs got louder as the two boys scaled the two cases of stairs which separated them. They hadn't even entered the room before Harry began speaking.

"You'll never guess what the super important meeting was about!"

Despite it being Sunday, Harry and Ron had been called into work by Minister Shacklebolt, being told that the meeting was of the upmost importance. Despite not wanting to disrupt their Sunday, they had conceded to the fact that, should there be something important going on they would want to know. They had left a few hours ago, leaving Hermione and Ginny to spend the day as they planned to. The two girls had considered going themselves, but dismissed it eventually because having not being summoned; they doubted they would be allowed to listen if it really was that important.

Which of course it turned out not to be.

Both boys came through the door with mildly irritated expressions on their faces, Ron's perhaps a ounce more furious than Harry's.

"By the looks of your faces I assume they reassigned toilet cleaning duties to the Aurors?" Hermione joked.

Ron was not amused. Harry, however, tried not to let the quirk of his lips betray his mirth.

"No" Ron said, "There wasn't an announcement at all! You know Old Nutter?"

The name Old Nutter was one which Ron had long ago coined to refer to an elderly man named Mr Paisley who worked in the Auror's department. None of the Aurors were entirely sure why he worked there, but he had been a part of the force longer than any of the others and had somehow gained some level of authority. For some reason he had found favour with all the heads of the department, and as such was never asked to leave, despite his inability and unwillingness to participate and any part of the job description. The elderly man had a few quirks which made him seem a little peculiar and he was often very short with people; inspiring the nickname Old Nutter.

Hermione nodded at Ron's question.

"Well" Harry continued, "The whole meeting was pretty much an opportunity for him to moan at us about our incompetencies. We were told to arrive at one, which we did, and then he made us wait, only arriving at about twenty to two. And when he finally did arrive he gave this whole speech about punctuality, saying he arrived late as a _lesson_ to us all."

"Yeah!" Ron carried on, "Then he went on about bloody 'desk aesthetics'! Saying how a tidy desk is a tidy mind and that back in his day he would never have seen such blatant disregard for _morality_. Complete and utter nutter."

Hermione was working extra hard not to laugh at their expense but Ginny didn't hold back in the slightest, barking a laugh before offering a kind smile to Harry in consolation. He walked over to her and sat down on the bottom half of the bed so that Ginny could place her feet on his legs as she often did, his hand resting on her ankle familiarly.

Harry sighed, "So that was complete waste of time".

Hermione noticed a small grin growing on Ron's face and she raised an eyebrow in question.

"You know who he reminds me of?" He said, "Filch. They could be twins."

Harry chuckled. "I think Filch worked a bit more, remember trying to sneak past him and Mrs Norris after curfew before we got the cloak? Complete nightmare." Harry seemed to consider something for a second before he continued, "He has got the exact some vindictive streak though."

"Yeah!"Ron agreed, " Remember when Filch said he wanted to hang us from the ceilings by our wrists or something? Fred and George once said he threatened them with disembowelment"

Harry grinned at the memory, "I've not had anything that bad with Paisley yet, but then again I do try to avoid him as much as possible."

Ron laughed, nodding to say that he did too.

"So a ministry official who is like Filch except older with more authority and less work ethic?" Hermione summarised.

Ron grinned, "Exactly!"

They relaxed into an amused silence and enjoyed the light feeling in the air, no one saying anything until Ginny spoke for the first time in a while.

"That was so freaky!"

They all turned to her in confusion.

She held up the future book to show them that was what she had been reading, Hermione had almost forgotten. "I know the whole point of the book is that is shows the future but actually seeing it was so weird."

"Huh?" Ron asked.

Ginny rolled her eyes and lifted her feet off Harry's lap, lowering them over the side and sitting up straight with the book open on her knees. "I just followed the conversation in the book as you were saying it, and it was spot on! It was from Hermione's point of view, of course, but everything you said was exactly right. I didn't even close to book to rewrite it."

Hermione felt a little uncomfortable that their conversations could be predicted so easily.

Ginny seemed to be thinking the same thing, "The magic must be incredible" She said, "Being able to predict us so perfectly".

Harry moved so he sat closer to Ginny, looking at the book in her lap, "Is what we're saying now in there?"

Ginny's eyes scanned the text, and she shook her head. "No, it's like when we don't pay attention to it, everything goes as predicted, but it's easy to go against and change it if you know what not to do."

Hermione mulled that over, considering how best to use the book now that they knew that's how it worked.

"It's like the book doesn't take into account that someone might not want to maintain the future it has written"

Ginny nodded.

There were so many thoughts and conclusions and theories going round Hermione's mind from the last few days that she decided she needed to write it all down. She went to reach for some parchment which was on a desk in the corner of the room, but she was getting so sick of the piles of parchment she was using, so she thought of a better idea. She summoned the book she had bought from Scallion's scissors with a quick accio spell instead, and then reached for her self-inking quill which sat on the small table next to her and began to write her notes.

"Okay" she said to the others as she wrote the title _The Art of Adventurous Living – Notes_ at the top of the page. "In this book I'm going to keep all of the notes and findings about the book, so if you think or notice anything important about it, write your findings in the back and I will write up everything at the front once we have all the information."

The others nodded or hummed their agreement, and she smiled as she got into the familiar process of categorising and defining the thoughts on the page.

This was how Hermione's great book of notes was started.

* * *

 _Monday_

Despite everything else that was going on, Hermione still had her job. It wasn't much of one, with no pay, no friends and no accomplishments to be proud of, but it was a job all the same. And seeing as Monday had arrived, Hermione had to return to it. Thankfully she had managed to write the remaining reports which were due today on Sunday afternoon so she had everything in order, but that didn't make the job any easier.

It was about half past one, after nearly five hours of her boss's snark and muddy footprints she finally got her break.

Being in the Department of the Regulation and Control of Magical Creatures put her on a completely different floor to the Auror's department, and as such she and the boys spent very little time together, despite working in the same building. So it had become tradition that they would always take their break at a specific place so that if either of the others were having a break at the same time they would be able to spend it together.

The system worked. There was a large room on the third level which had been charmed so that the large windows let in a lot of light and showed a view of a beautiful city park, as well as there being a light breeze flowing comfortably through the room. It was pleasant and gave the illusion that they were in a kind of gazebo-like room during the fantastic weather of summer. The bench they chose was in the far right corner as they walked in, and as the other workers were so used to the three of them using it, it was always free for them to sit there.

However, today the other boys seemed to be stuck on some assignment and neither came down for food when she ate, so Hermione sat alone. Not that this bothered her very much, she enjoyed the solace and it gave her a chance to just relax in the comfortable surroundings.

The tables in this room were always stocked with a couple of copies of the ministry's newsletters, charmed to arrive at nine each morning on the end of the bench, so to occupy her mind Hermione picked on up.

Thankfully, these newsletters weren't the gossipy kind. There were made solely for the use of those in the ministry and contained summarises of the main news articles as well as any announcements or requests from the heads of each department. They cut out a lot of the waffle and bias which usually spoiled newspapers, and Hermione rather enjoyed being able to update herself on things during a single lunch break, rather than taking hours riffling through the exaggerations and misinterpretations of writers like Rita Skeeta.

She let her eyes flick through the titles as she ate her lunch, taking in the most recent things.

 _Preparations finally begin for the celebration of..._

 _Scholars debate over the importance of the 1763 report on..._

 _... trying to restore the old or revolutionise a new reputation?_

 _The newest girl on the arm of..._

She stopped briefly to read the paragraph entitled _Anouncement For All Aurors_ , explaining that everyone in the department was needed for yet another meeting today from 1-2, which explained why Hermione was eating alone.

The next article which caught her eye spoke of a group of activists who have been becoming more and more influential throughout the last two years. While she did see the merit of some of the things they said, Hermione didn't really agree with their message and was nervous to see how much attention they were starting to get.

 _The Secrecy Abolishists take a stand_

 _Once again the 'Secrecy Abolishists', lead by head activist Vincent Matthams, have taken a stand for their cause by protesting in Diagon Ally at the entrance to the Leaky Cauldron. The morning began with only 10 protestors, but grew throughout the day ending with over 200 wizards and witches standing in the name of freedom of information and expression._

 _Despite the negative attention they garnered from those who oppose their political ideals, the activists stayed until late in the evening, leaving with a sense of victory and comradery in how many observers had stayed to show their support._

 _This Secrecy Abolishists first appeared during the months after the fall of You-Know-Who, named as they are due to their regular criticism of the International Statute of Wizarding Secrecy, and the vulnerability they say it enforces on Wizardkind living in muggle towns and villages. Since then, the movement has grown and developed, attracting the attention of many political and social figures; the topic becoming widely debated amongst all social circles._

 _Since being first signed in 1689 the international statute of Wizarding Secrecy ensured the..._

The article went on to briefly explain the history of the secrecy laws and political consequences should it be abolished. It was dangerous, Hermione thought, to let the fear of attack dissolve the protection the statute provided. Not that this response was entirely unexpected, but Hermione hoped it wouldn't go so far so to retract the whole thing.

She looked up in surprise when she felt the presence of someone sitting next to her, thinking that Harry and Ron would be in their meeting instead of meeting her for lunch. But what was more surprising than the possibility of the meeting finishing early, which never happened, was the fact she was now sitting next to someone that she hadn't seen in quite a number of months.

"Neville!" She said, a huge smile blossoming on her face. "What brings you here, isn't there a class waiting for you to impart wisdom to them?"

He grinned, obviously happy to see her. "Not this afternoon. The ministry called me in for some sort of advising... I'm not really sure, but I'll find out in about half an hour."

Hermione took a moment to notice his appearance, having not seen him in so long. His hair was cut smartly and he wore long official Hogwarts professor robes which suited him perfectly. She couldn't help the little feeling of pride she felt for him as she saw him succeeding in his job.

"That sounds exciting" She said, genuinely interested. "Herbology themed advice?"

He nodded, "Most likely, though I have been told very little to be honest. I'll have to wait and see" He looked down at the paper in her hands. "What's the world been up to this week then?"

"The ordinary things, I'm happy to say; nothing too dramatic." Hermione said as she continued reading the article on the activists while Neville read through the others commenting on a few as he went through.

"Malfoy has been in the papers an awful lot lately" He said after a bit, " _Malfoy Heir trying to restore the old or revolutionise a new reputation?_ They're really debating whether he wants to go back to the old Malfoy tradition of dark magic and everything, load of rubbish I think."

Hermione made a questioning hum, prompting him to continue, though most of her concentration was on her own article.

"Yeah. He's been giving money to Hogwarts for the rebuild and to some shops in Diagon alley since his dad died, I can't believe they think he's just doing it for influence."

Hermione looked up at this, surprised by Neville's adamant defence. "He might be" She said casually, "We don't know him very well, considering everything he's done before it's not much of a leap."

Neville shook his head, "I've spoken to him a bit at Hogwarts recently, he's come to see McGonagall a couple of times this term, seems like a pretty decent bloke"

She raised her eyebrows in mild surprise. "Oh, good for him" She said before they moved on to a different topic of conversation.

"Do you know what that Auror meeting is about?" Neville asked her.

"No, I wonder if it is actually important or not." She laughed a little at the memory of Harry and Ron's annoyed faces before telling Neville what had happened the day before, and earning a chuckle from him.

After a few more minutes of conversation Neville checked the time and realised he was almost late to his meeting with the head of the Department of Magical Accidents and Catastrophes. "I better be off" He said standing up, "We should all meet up soon, It's been far too long."

She agreed enthusiastically and waved as he walked away, before getting back to the article at hand.

* * *

 _Tuesday_

It was on this day that the reply finally came through. To the relief of all four of them, 'Cricket', or whatever his real name was, agreed to help. Harry had been alone at Grimmauld place when his new owl arrived back with the letter tied to her leg, so before opening it he cast a patronus to each of them, and within a few minutes they all arrived with anticipation and curiosity in their gazes.

They sat on the seats surrounding the table in the living room as Harry opened the letter, bending over to read the elegant writing of their possible witness.

 _Mr Potter_ , he wrote.

 _It is a pleasure to hear from you, I'm happy to help in whatever way I can._

 _The man you refer to goes by Frank Vanhope, he's a number of years my junior so I only knew him for year at Hogwarts before I left, so I'm afraid I can't give you much information about him as a person, except that he did have a reputation of being something of a prodigy._

 _I do believe he lived in the muggle city Brighton for a while though; he was always a strange one like that._

 _I wish you and your investigations all the best,_

 _Jiminy Cricket_

They all sat their quietly for a moment considering what this meant.

They were making headway, getting closer to whomever it was who created this book with such dangerous potential. What they expected to do once they found him, Hermione didn't actually know, but she did know that his project needed to be stopped before whatever planned he had got out of hand.

"Frank Vanhope" Ron read outloud. "I guess he's our man."

* * *

 **Ooh, they're making headway! Don't worry though; the story is very far from over.**

 **I hope you guys appreciated the mention of Draco, it's taking so long to get him in the story so I just had to put him in there somewhere!**

 **Let me know what you think! xoxo**


	6. Parchment, Exaggerations and Habituality

The man sat down on the side of the bed, looking around the little room he sat in. It was small, there was no doubt, but it contained pretty much everything he needed. His bed took up one wall; on the one to his left was a long desk with a shelf above it holding his few belongings he kept with him. On the far wall was the door, and on the final wall was a small fire place with lazy flames licking up the sides of the chamber. All the walls looked patchily discoloured, even a little mouldy above the desk, but that was okay. The drab conditions didn't particularly bother him, he wasn't one to fuss very much about that sort of thing, knowing he was going to move to another place fairly soon anyway, depending on where he was needed or wanted to go.

He absently fingered the piece of parchment in the pockets of his muggle jacket. He found that he was getting used to their strange sense of attire that Muggles wore and appreciating the way that the fabric moved with his legs rather than billowing around them like his robes used to do. He still kept his robes of course, for when he had to do his various trips to Gringotts or the shops when he got a job, but hiding out in the muggle world was suiting him perfectly well. He didn't share the same disgust of Muggles as some of those he knew, not that he thought they were worth anything important, but he didn't feel the need to stay away lest they contaminate him or something ridiculous like that.

He took the piece of parchment out of his pocket, unfolding it to show the statement he had from his trip to Gringotts yesterday. It was covered in the usual official information, his name, account and balance, along with the recent transactions into and out of it.

The most recent input, an obscenely large number of galleons, had come from his backer; an individual with very deep pockets who was consistently giving him the means to complete the little tasks he was given. He would probably be grateful for their generosity were he the sort of person to do that, but of course he wasn't, so he just carried on as he was.

He looked up onto the desk to see the remains of his most recent set of projects. Amongst scraps of paper and a few bottles of strange looking concoctions, there was a pile of notebooks, the few left that he had yet to send off to their new owners. The rich colouring and delicate detail stood out strangely against the mucky surroundings of the room he found himself it.

But they weren't important right now, so focusing back on the task at hand, he did what he should have done as soon as he got his bank statement. He lent forward and chucked it into the fire, the flames burning away all of the evidence.

* * *

"Oh, you bet your arse, Harry Potter!" Ginny was yelling up the stairs. "Some boyfriend!" She added, trying her best to keep her amusement out of her voice. Harry's laughter could be heard from the top of the flight of stairs as he continued on his mission to escape his furious girlfriend.

It was Thursday morning, Harry and the other visitors of Grimmauld place, currently Ginny and Hermione, were all getting ready for work. The two women had taken to staying there most nights that week because it was much closer to both of their jobs, and while Hermione was growing bored of the solace of being alone in her apartment, Ginny had gotten sick of the constant noise at hers.

This coming weekend the Weasleys were having a gathering to celebrate Molly's birthday, and each day more people were arriving, so not only had Ginny wanted to escape the noise but she had also been pushed out of her room in order to have enough space for the guests to stay.

Foolishly, she had thought that staying out the house might also give her the opportunity to miss out on the worst of the chores, but it turns out she could not have been more wrong. Just earlier that morning her mother had informed her that the job had fallen to Ginny to go and collect their Aunt Muriel, because the elderly lady refused to take the floo.

Ginny's Aunt Muriel was a strange sort, her aversion to following suggestions and dedication to contrariness made her quite difficult to deal with. Her most recent belief was that the flames from the floo powder physically burnt away intellect, that being of course why her great grand-children were 'so dim-witted'. It was for this reason that Ginny had the delightful task of collecting her from her house by broom.

When Ginny had first heard the news she had tried to rope Harry into helping her, but having met her aunt Muriel once before Harry chose, with no indecision whatsoever, to reject that offer entirely.

Ginny, of course, followed his response with a fierce glare, one which would usually have a wizard shaking in his boots. But like the foolhardy Gryffindor that he was, Harry smiled in a face of it saying, "You could never hate me" To which Ginny had yelled her disagreement as he ran away from her up the stairs.

This brought them to the current moment.

"When do you have to leave?" Hermione asked Ginny when she had dropped the faux annoyed expression.

"Tomorrow" She pulled a face, "I'd really rather not. But I don't have practice that day, so I have no way to get out of it".

Hermione chuckled, "How are you and Jones anyway? She seemed a little miffed that you kept stuff from her"

Ginny looked a little irritated, not at Hermione but just at the situation. "I'm still keeping stuff from her, it's difficult" She smiled away the annoyance, "We're okay though, she got over it quickly I think."

Hermione smiled, "I'm glad."

They both settled into comfortable silence for a few seconds, and Hermione ran over their meeting with Jones in Diagon Alley in her head. There was something that felt a little weird about it.

Hermione knew she had been a little paranoid since the war, and it was only natural ,she assured herself; but she'd been trying to reign herself in whenever something minuscule would set off those internal alarm bells. They had been helpful during the war as most things which looked suspicious actually were, but in the two years since it had passed, she had been making sure that she quietened the warnings.

That progress was immediately halted as soon as she found the future book, with all her previous behaviour she had learned in the war coming right back.

She was about to voice her suspicions to Ginny, but stopped when her friend started speaking anyway.

"Well, I've got to go get ready now" Ginny said, indicating the dressing gown she currently wore, "and try _once again_ to get Harry's help with dear auntie" She shook her head as if she knew it was a futile effort.

They laughed and parted ways, Hermione's mind still swirling in her endless trail of theories.

* * *

The hunt for Frank Vanhope began on the sixth floor of the ministry. This floor was primarily home to the Department of Magical Transportation, and as such Hermione had spent little time there. Though in the time she had, she always found herself feeling quite lost, even though there was very difference between this floor and the others; Hermione suspected there was something in the magic of it. But among all the confusing ones was an almost empty corridor, with no doors other than a single grey one entitled 'Filing'.

Rather than eating in the break room on floor 3, today the group had decided to skip lunch and arranged to meet here to make some headway in the investigations. The ministry had files on everyone who goes through Hogwarts, and that makes up the majority of the wizarding population in England, so they had decided to see how much they could find out about the buyer of those books. This much information being on record was quite terrifying in the war when the ministry was infiltrated, but Hermione was very grateful for the bank of information right now.

With the filing room containing all the reports and data the ministry owned, Hermione had assumed it would be huge; filled to the brim with cabinets and files, with too much parchment for even a logical witch like her to make sense of. But as they opened the door, they saw that this was not the case at all. The room was no more than three meters wide by four meters long, and contained a single table, similar to one that someone might keep beside their bed. It was made out of a beautiful dark wood, but over time it seemed to have become run down and there was now a smudge mark on the handle left from the thousands of hands which regularly opened it.

The walls of the room, _or cupboard_ Hermione thought, were fairly dark and unappealing, and there was a level of low light in the room that she couldn't seem to identify to source of.

"This is it?" Ron said in disbelief as Harry closed the door behind them.

"Seems like it" Harry said looking round, "Was it just me or were you guys expecting more than this?"

Hermione laughed, "Definitely not just you."

Bemused at the complete lack on contents, Hermione opened the draw in the small table and they all gathered round to see what she found. Inside there was a selection of around 10 thin files standing neatly with their titles clearly written on the spines. The majority of the folders represented a department, such as that for the Department of Magical Accidents and Catastrophes which was looking much more battered, evidently being used more than the rest. The rest of the folders had titles such as "Finance" or "Maintenance" which obviously focused on the ministry as a whole rather than just a specific section.

Lest to say, Hermione was a little confused. Each file was only about half a centimetre thick as if they didn't contain any records at all. She picked up a folder at random, and opened it expecting to see an undetectable extension charm, or directions to where the files were kept. But instead they only saw the inside of the file with no contents whatsoever. She closed the cover and flicked it open again in case it contained magic which was somehow faulty, but yet again nothing appeared.

She looked over at Harry and Ron who wore identically confused expressions before back down at the files.

"Oh, wait" Harry said. He reached down to pick up a folder labelled 'instructions', quickly opening it. Instead of being completely empty like the previous one, there was a single piece of parchment with only a few sentences on its surface.

 _ **INSTRUCTIONS**_

 _Put open folder on floor._

 _Jump into it._

 _Done._

 _ **Nothing happened?**_

 _No clearance._

 _ **Want to return from folder?**_

 _Use incantation "Ieri" (standard pronunciation) with anticlockwise Marshman's Flick._

Harry flipped the piece of paper over to check the back; there was nothing else to know, apparently.

"Okay, so we just jump into a piece of paper... right?" He said looking to Hermione with a raised eyebrow.

Having both grown up in Muggle families, Hermione and Harry had often shared in the strangeness of magic while in school. As they got more familiar with everything, especially with all the magic they saw during the war, these moments became less; but jumping into a piece of paper, that wasn't something that they had voluntarily done before.

Harry grimaced in thought, "Kind of reminds me of Riddle's diary".

Ron made a disgusted face in agreement, "Yeah, I'm sure this is fine though. Which folder do we want to go into anyway?"

Hermione looked down at them, and on spotting one called Personnel Records and Contacts.

"This one?" She said, she lifting it out of the draw. "We could start here anyway. Unless we wanted to look for his name through criminal records?" she pointed towards the file labelled The Department of Magical Law Enforcement.

"Probably the personnel one, right?" Ron said, "He might have managed to use aliases in crime if he's good, which he probably is with all the magic he used on the book and everything"

Hermione and Harry nodded.

"Alright then." Hermione opened the folder, and just as before, it was entirely blank, but this time she put it down on a section of empty floor and looked up to the boys for their agreement that she go first.

At their nods, she lifted her foot, lowering it carefully onto the file. She expected her shoe to go straight through, but it hit the hard surface as if she were standing on any other ordinary piece of parchment. She was about to suggest that perhaps she didn't have the clearance as the instructions had said, but as soon as her second foot touched the page she fell straight through, her vision disappearing as she did.

oOoOo

The second room was very similar to the first; small, a little dingy, very minimalistic with the single table. It was kind of like a contents page or a filter, Hermione thought, these two rooms were focusing in on the area of interest, and you just keep moving through these filters until you reach the desired information. Hermione thought it was actually rather clever, in spite of how dramatic it tried to make the simple process of filing.

The two boys arrived just after she did, thankfully not appearing in the same space as her or anything like that.

They looked through the drawer and repeated the same process as before. There was a folder named 'Informants' that Harry looked interested in visiting, but they otherwise ignored the other folders. They chose the folder called Wizardfolk, and jumped through into the next room as they had before.

This time when they arrived, the room was very different. An altogether similar aesthetic, the same walls and low lighting, but this time the room was at least 6 times the size, and the wall in front of them was covered in the biggest set of draws Hermione had ever seen. It looked a little more like the muggle filing cabinets which Hermione had expected them to look like. The whole cabinet had thirty draws, being six across and five high, but only twenty-six of them looked to be in use. Each of these twenty-six had a letter of the alphabet written on the front panel.

"This looks more like what we're after" Hermione said.

 _Right,_ she thought _, Vanhope, where are you?_

"Where is V?" she asked the others.

They spotted it up in the top right.

"Great" Ron said, "How do we get to it?"

"Good question" Hermione muttered.

Thinking of how they had figured it out before, she walked forwards and opened the unlabelled draw at the bottom of the rightmost column and looked for an instruction manual. But it was empty, void of any files at all.

"Anything?" Ron called from where he stood next to Harry back where they had arrived.

"Nope" she said walking back. "How about..."

She flicked her wand towards the drawer, non-verbally casting an Accio spell, and that is when the cabinet started to change. The letters on the front of the draws seemed to catch her attention, as if they were becoming a higher definition than they had been before.

Hermione blinked a few times to make sure her eyes were not playing tricks on her.

After a few seconds, the letters in the middle of the cabinet began to light up quickly and disappear, switching places with each other. The positions of each letter rapidly changed, switching with those further out until the letters looked to be simply flashing due to the fast pace they kept changing.

It was after only about fifteen seconds of this that they began to slow, settling into positions on different draws, with the letter V in the middle at the bottom, at a perfect height for them to open.

 _So dramatic_ , she couldn't help but think.

"That was cool" Harry said, breaking the silence that had formed as they watched.

Ron nodded enthusiastically, "Yeah".

They all walked towards the draw and pulled it open to show the undetectable extension charm Hermione had been expecting before. The draw extended for meters out of the cabinet, filled with thousands of files all named after those whose Surname ends in V.

They all sat around it, flicking through the files as they searched for their suspect.

 _Vance, Catharine_

 _Vance, Emmiline_

 _Vance, Jacob_

 _Vanhope, Benjamin_

 _Vanhope, Frank_

She pulled out the file and opened it, setting it on the floor beside them so they could all look at it from where they sat.

A picture sat on top of the rest of the pages, showing the moving picture of an attractive young man with dusty blond hair and a pointed face. He was sitting on the grass outside of the greenhouses at Hogwarts, his sleeves were pushed up past his elbows and he leaned his arms on his knees, laughing in amusement. Next to him sat a girl with more Scandinavian features, with longer dark hair and a slightly wider chin. Both wore Slytherin green ties around their necks, and were looking at each other, clearly sharing in a joke one of them had just told.

On the back of the photo a phrase was written out in ink.

 _Frank with girlfriend Joanne Heilesen - 1972_

Hermione put the photo down and began to look through the rest of the file. As she read more a profile of him began building itself in her mind.

He was an activist, a real thinker, someone who stood up for what he believed but did it in ways that were well thought out. He had worked up the ladder of influence in the Muggle Liaison Office and used that to travel to France as a representative of the British ministry to the French. The Vanhope family had only been part of the Wizarding world for four generations, the child of the muggle Steven Vanhope starting Hogwarts in 1912; and as a result Frank had a large group of muggle relatives who he maintained contact with, all who lived in France.

Hermione couldn't help thinking they probably would have got on well. _Too bad he has a side life manipulating dangerous magic_.

Towards the back of his file it kept a log of actions with the ministry. She looked to the most recent account; apparently he booked a Portkey to France for the following afternoon.

"Guys, I've found something..."

She looked up to see that Harry and Ron were no longer looking at the file with her, in fact they had a different draw open and were looking at some other files, chatting quietly about what they found. How they had managed to do all that without her noticing, Hermione didn't know.

"Whose file are you looking at?" She asked them curiously.

Harry turned to her and grinned, "Mine. You know they have those personality summaries on page two? They're so funny to read through."

She laughed, "Let's hear it then."

Ron took the page and stood up dramatically. Holding the page out in front of him and holding his arms out wide as if reading a dramatic rendition of Shakespeare.

"Orphaned..." He began, holding his free hand to his chest in exaggerated sympathy.

"Neglected and mistreated..."

Harry looked at Hermione was amusement in his eyes, not remotely affected by what the folder said.

"... young Harry Potter grew up from the most tragic of beginnings. Known worldwide by Wizarding kind to be the Boy-Who-Lived, Harry grew up with the eyes of the world watching him..."

Ron made a faux earnest face, holding out his free hand in front of him as if his next words were the most important things they would ever hear, "and yet!..."

A few soft chuckles fell from Hermione's lips.

"...he continued to grow in humility and bravery, finding a home in Gryffindor house! This was where he befriended the _magnificent_ , the _brilliant_ , the one and only... Ron-"

"No way!" Harry called out as he laughed, "it does not say that!"

Ron grinned widely, "Sure it does!" He held the folder away as Harry tried to grab it from him.

Ron really was ridiculous sometimes, Hermione thought, but she couldn't stop the bubbles of laughter which escaped her mouth, nor did she want to. She laughed from her stomach and he grinned at her with such sincerity that she couldn't help but smile.

He turned to look at her, giving the folder to Harry easily when he met her eyes. There was so much affection in them that Hermione felt like there was something particular in his gaze that he was trying to communicate. She sent him a questioning expression, as if to ask what he was trying to say, but he just kept looking with that same smile, providing her with no more answers that she had before.

She thought she knew though, it was a similar look to the one Harry often gave Ginny, and the thought made Hermione warm inside. It was all a little too much though, she didn't feel quite so strongly so it felt a little uncomfortable for her to sit in it. She broke the eye contact to look at Harry who was purposefully looking down at his folder as if he had noticed the change in atmosphere and didn't want to disturb it.

* * *

The Portkey Frank Vanhope was going to take was in a meadow. It was an old can of beer which had evidently been drunk and left by Muggles years ago and left in a spot near the hedge-line. While the rest of the meadow was filled with much taller wild flowers, this patch was only covered in an uneven layer of grass which remained short due to the amount of people often walking over it, so the can was easily visible.

It was due to activate in just fifteen minutes, but as of yet, Vanhope hadn't made an appearance. It was traditional to arrive ridiculously early to a portkey, just to avoid the risk of missing it, but for some reason they were still waiting for him.

Hermione, Harry and Ron were crouching behind some of the taller plants along the hedge-line, very much out of sight. In fact, Hermione had been quite proud of the spot they had found as it was perfect in terms of both camouflage and their vision of the portkey.

Ginny, who had wanted to come, but was spending the day collecting her particularly difficult great Aunt up from her home, could not be with them; much to her displeasure of course. But Hermione thought that both Harry and Ron were happier that she were safe somewhere else rather than trying to catch a fortunetelling meddle-man. Though why she needed to be protected when Ginny was a perfectly capable witch, Hermione didn't get.

Looking sideways at Ron and Harry now, Hermione couldn't help but notice something which all three of them seemed to have in common in that moment. Despite the fact that her heart was beating fast in anticipation, and she felt nerves flutter in her stomach as they waited; there was something in the situation which felt so familiar, so natural. Looking at the expressions on her friends' faces she knew they felt the same.

Ever since the war ended, things changed in their lives. It was definitely for the better, but after a year on the run, and the years before that in fear, it was strange to be expected to easily fall into 'normal' life. They had managed it, but there was something about being in this situation which felt almost like muscle memory, and they fell back into the patterns and tactical thinking which had become so second nature to them before.

At the pop of someone apparating, they all paid attention.

In the middle of the field they saw a man with blond hair and a large backpack hanging haphazardly over his shoulder. He obviously didn't have many belongings with him, despite the fact he was obviously going to stay in France, but Hermione guess you didn't need much when a job in the dark arts keeps you on the move. He was clearly the same man as the one in the folder; while looking much older, he had the same shaped face and shoulders as he did as a young adult. Hermione couldn't help thinking that everything about him was considerably less attractive because she knew of his allegiances.

He looked quite ragged, as if he'd been sleeping rough for the last few days, and was walking strangely as if his back hurt a little bit.

Ignoring any sympathy she might have for him, Hermione followed the plan, shooting a strong stupefy spell.

Frank Vanhope fell straight to the ground unconscious.

* * *

 **I meant to get their entire trip in one chapter but my writing got away from me, so it'll continue in the next chapter!**

 **And don't worry, there isn't any proper Ron/Hermione in here, the dynamic will soon change.**

 **Let me know what you're thinking so far!**


	7. Spells, Mistakes and Moving on

**I know, this chapter is so short, and I haven't uploaded in ages, I'm sorry! I need to get back into the rhythm of it, and I will, most likely, but my life has been pretty eventful recently! Hopefully I will though.**

 **I haven't checked it through much, so I'm sorry for any mistakes, but I really wanted to post it! So I'll do that tomorrow.**

 **Enjoy!**

* * *

His eyes hurt.

It was an aching sort of fuzzy presence behind his eyes and nose; one he had never found particularly pleasant, especially when coupled with the loud banging of the headache he had behind his forehead. But due to a friend he had had at Hogwarts who had been particularly fond of pranking him, he knew the feeling well enough to recognise it as a stunning spell.

He groaned, vaguely trying to open his eyes. But as he tried to move his arms he quickly began to notice that he was tied against something and his eyes instantly opened in shock. He looked around at the situation which surrounded him, and was met with three famous faces looking down at him in thinly failed unease.

* * *

 _Five minutes earlier_

They all watched as the red colour of the stunning spell hit its target, and the tall man fell down unceremoniously onto the field.

They immediately set to work. Hermione levitated Vanhope over to the trunk of the nearest tree which sat just this side of the hedge, and easily bound his arms to his side with an incarsorous spell, before looking back over to Harry and Ron. They were both crouching on the patchy grass where Frank's Backpack had fallen, with the bag open in Ron's hands as they looked through it. It clearly had an extension charm in it, because the pile on the floor kept growing at Harry emptied it all out.

There were piles of clothes of many colours; vials and bottles of various concoctions; and a large amount of books on the traditions, linguistic various and cultures of muggle groups .

Hermione walked over and picked up a strange looking bottle in curiosity, studying the neat hand written label which said _The Mists of Calypso's Loch – 02.06.96._ The vial looked almost empty, though it was evidently not as there were small wisps which appeared every so often, sparking in the light of the afternoon sun.

Hermione noted the name of the sample, deciding she would look it up later as she wasn't familiar with it, and put it back on the pile.

Harry had been digging through the bag for a few minutes by that point, but with a triumphant grin he exclaimed "Ah ha!" and finally lifted out a familiar looking notebook. It looked exactly the same as the future book, and Hermione eagerly took it when Harry passed it to her.

But, unlike hers, this book had no title inside the cover. It just had an inscription, written in the same hand writing as that on the label of the vial.

 _À ma merveilleuse filleule,_

 _Je te donne ce livre dans l'espoir que tu puisses..._

The text continued, but to save time, Hermione quickly flicked her wand at the text to check for any dangerous enchantments, and on finding none she cast another translate it to English.

She pushed down her confusion at finding nothing unusual about the book, and started reading the inscription out loud to the Ron who was looking anxious to see what she had found, while Harry continued digging through Vanhope's bag.

"There's nothing unusual about the book" She said with a sigh, "which doesn't really make sense. But he has written a paragraph on the first page, like an inscription."

"Oh" Ron said with a confused expression. "Maybe he only enchants some of them? What did he write?"

Hermione focused back on the magically altered writing on the page and read it out loud.

 _To my wonderful Goddaughter,_

 _I give you this book in the hope that you finally get around to pursuing your dreams. I have the utmost faith in you, and wish you the best in all you do._

 _I can't wait to hear about everything you have been up to in Nice._

 _All my love,_

 _Uncle Frank_

"That sounds... ordinary" Ron said sounding bemused, " this might just be me, but that's not something I'd write in the front of a fortunetelling book"

Hermione laughed a little under her breath, "Me neither".

It was at this moment when Harry spoke up. "I've found something as well"

As Hermione had been reading out the inscription, Harry had been compiling a pile of books by his side, all of the same beautiful style as her notebook. The top book was open with another French inscription showing, addressed to a man named Matthew. Hermione vaguely noticed some references to a previous holiday and some kind sentiments about the recipient's current partner.

"They all have these inscriptions and don't have any enchantments, I've been checking them." He said. "And look how many there are too"

The pile was made up of many books. She counted them carefully, just to be sure.

Ron spoke up. "Nine books" he said.

She thought back to the moment in Scallion's Scissors when the shop keeper had told them about the sale.

" _...Why, a couple of weeks back a guy came in and bought nine of them, said he was buying them for some friends he was visiting in France or something"_

She nodded. "Nine books, so he couldn't have made the future book".

Ron thought for a second, "What if he had just duplicated the book?"

She shook her head sadly. "Copies always have a magical signature, a marker showing they're made from magic. It would have come up with the detection charm I cast."

The three of them shared a look as it fully dawned on them.

"We've got the wrong person." Hermione said.

They all looked over to the man they currently had tied up against the tree, unconscious with his head lolling back against the trunk.

"So what do we do about Vanhope?"

* * *

Frank Vanhope, as expected, didn't take the news very well.

They had released him from his bonds and returned his wand before the explanation, so he now stood in front of them with an almost tangible air of fury, looking decidedly intimidating.

"You _ambushed_ me, _stunned_ me, and bound me to _a tree_ , because you thought I enchanted a book?"

Hermione went to correct his understatement but he looked at her wearing a particularly Malfoy-like snarl, so she let him continue.

"But not only that, no, you thought that I was actually trying to manipulate the Wizarding world and resurrect the Dark Lord with the secrets I found in it? You know, you guys walk around with your assumptions just as much as everyone else; just because I was a Slytherin doesn't mean I support the murder of half the entire population of the world and blindly follow the illusions of a hypocrite on the boundaries of insanity. So if you're done with your ridiculousness, I'd rather go and be with my family."

Before they could reply he flicked his wand to return his belongings to his enchanted bag, summoned it, and walked over to the Portkey just before it left to France. Leaving the three young people left behind in the empty field with their mistake heavy on their consciousness.

* * *

"So where did we go wrong?" Ginny asked, sitting on her bed, leaning forward with her elbows on her knees.

Upon returning from the whole extravaganza, Hermione, Harry and Ron made their way to the burrow to explain everything to Ginny. She, of course, had spent the day transporting her great aunt Muriel by broom, and was visually exhausted, her eyelids dropping slightly under their weight, and her shoulders slumping.

Hermione sat opposite Ginny in a arm chair which faced the bed, Harry sat next to Ginny and Ron sat on the floor against the wall to their right.

"I guess it was the assumption that a wizard buying a large number of books must be the same person that bought the one I found." Hermione said, "In fact, thinking back, I have no idea why we assumed that in the first place."

Ron nodded in agreement.

At a small yawn from Ginny, Harry gently placed his hand on her back to comfort her in her tiredness and she smiled at him sleepily.

"Whatever the case" he then said, "We're back to square one."

* * *

In another part of the country, a man was just finishing packing up his things.

He had been right; he had only had to stay there a few days before his mission took him somewhere else; and while the aesthetics of the room didn't matter too much to him, by this point he was sick to death of this grimy little room.

He had found himself getting familiar with the patterns on mould over his desk, and the floorboard right by his bed which creaked each time he stood on it. It was about time he got a new place to stay, he thought.

The man grabbed his bag which he kept at the foot of his bed and set to work packing up the rest of his things. He lined the jars and scrolls along the bottom and back of the backpack, on top of the few clothes he kept with him, and laid the notebooks delicately on top of everything else. He then zipped it all up and opened the door.

He didn't look back as he left room, slamming the door on his way out.


	8. Arguments, Conclusions and Reassessment

**Thank you so much to Maxp and the lovely guest reviewer who corrected my French – I'm embarrassed to say it was Google translate, haha. I've changed it now, hope that's better!**

 **Thank you everyone for such lovely support! Here's the next chapter,**

 **Enjoy xox**

* * *

The chime above her head rung as she pushed the door open, the smell of coffee and toast wafting through the warm air towards her.

The cafe looked just the way it did before. Hermione could see the doorway in the far corner which led outside to the little courtyard, but between her and there were the same small tables and bookshelves which lined the walls. There were a few customers sitting with their food, reading or writing as they usually did, and Hermione basked in the apparent normalness of their lives compared to the havoc that seemed unable to stay away from hers.

It felt like an age since she came in that time a week ago. Having had so much going on, she hadn't had the time to come back for the casual reading she usually did. But with their mistake from the day before, she decided it was best to come back to the roots of her investigation to rethink their choices.

She made her way through the front room, greeting the lady who worked behind the counter and ordering a cappuccino before walking out to the court yard. She looked over to where she had found the book and sat in the empty seat, pulling out the notebook she had bought at Scallion's Scissors and a muggle pen in order to make notes on her thoughts.

She set everything down, took a breath, and began to brainstorm.

She imagined she was the owner of The Art of Adventurous Living, sitting in the seat. _Why would they leave it behind?_ She thought. _Either it was left on purpose or by accident. Accident doesn't seem likely though. This book would not be something they would just_ forget _, it would most likely be the focus in their mind, or one of their main ones at least, due to the complexity and power of the magic they used. So if not by accident, it would have been left on purpose._

Hermione noted down, 'left on purpose', in the notebook, before getting back into her thoughts.

 _Then if it was left on purpose, it was left for someone. Given its magical origin, it was not likely left for the staff to find, especially given the nature of the story - to a muggle it would just be a fantasy novel. Unless of course the owners are also magical without me knowing, though that doesn't feel likely. But even if that was the case, they would probably leave it later in the day when there was less time for by passers to mess with the plan by finding it prematurely – like I did. So going by what is more likely, it would have been left for a customer._

Hermione lifted her pen and drew an arrow from her first sentence, writing the words 'for a customer'.

 _Now,_ she thought, _unless there was another magical customer who came that day or was expected to come that day, it was mostly likely left for me, especially as I'm the focus of the writing. And if I'm of such interest to the owner, they would most likely know that I sometimes come here, so they would have chosen a different location to avoid me coming into contact with it. So it was likely left for me._

She drew another arrow from there and the phrase 'for me' next to it, before looking up to see the lady she had ordered from walking over with her cappuccino.

She was quite a slight lady with a pixy cut of light brown hair which curled sweetly around her face. She smiled familiarly at Hermione as she approached.

"You've decided to change seat?" She lady asked, setting the cup and saucer down on the table.

Hermione smiled up at her, "Yeah, fancied a change of view". She then thanked her for the coffee and got back to her previous train of thought.

 _So if it was the owner's intention that I should find it, what did they expect me to do with it? And why would they give it up in the first place, such a piece of magic, such a source of information, why would they choose to give it up at all?_

She picked up her coffee and took a sip, humming approvingly at the strong taste.

 _Well, assuming that everything has gone to plan so far, the first thing I did was research the magic. The owner probably wouldn't have much to gain from this part; unless the book was made by a third party and they wanted someone to research how it was done. But if this was the case why risk giving it to me - the focus of the novel, why not give it to someone who would be willing to feedback to them, why all the mystery? Unless they gave it to me because I would have the most motive to figure out the method as it was relevant to my life and future. But none of these thoughts can really be discounted without further research._

 _So,_ she continued thinking, _the second thing I did was tell Harry and Ron. If them knowing was the intention, why not give it to them in the first place? Unless the objective was to get the three of us to team up to solve it? What would be the purpose of that though? The first place we went as a group was to Scallion's Scissors because Ginny mentioned that Jones had been noting in one that day..._

Hermione, who had been drinking intermittently during these thoughts put down her cup as a suspicion began to grow in her mind.

 _Isn't it coincidental that Gwen happened to be writing in her almost identical notebook that very day, writing in a place where she knew Ginny would see her? And given the friendship between the four of us, I was sure to tell them, so this sighting would not go unmentioned. But why would it be important for the four of us to meet up and go to Scallion's Scissors?_

She left her flow diagram for the time being and began writing a few lines below it. 'Jones involved?'

She couldn't imagine what could be gained from drawing the four of them to that shop, but as she ran through the encounter in her mind, one thing which hadn't crossed her mind until now became of most importance.

While in the shop they had been talking about the origin of the books and Mr Middleton had said, "...found them in a little shop by the Thames, stunning stuff"

 _The shop on the Thames, the owner must have bought the book there instead._

She quickly drunk the rest of her cappuccino and packed up her things and rushed through the cafe, hastily paying for her drink and making her way out onto the street, eager to get past their latest setback, and get back on the track of those really involved.

* * *

Aunt Muriel was quite an intimidating lady. Ginny took pride in being able to stand up for herself, the Gryffindor that she was, but there was something about her Great, Great Aunt's presence which made her feel slightly uncomfortable.

Muriel was not a tall woman, reaching only about five foot two in total, but she stood as if she were a whole lot taller than that, managing to look down her beaky nose even at those who were considerably taller than her. Ginny almost felt like she was looking up whenever they spoke, even though she was not nearly as short.

But, being stubborn, Ginny was determined not to let it bother her, so turned a blind eye to the judging looks, and closed her ears to the insults rather than letting them get to her. Growing up as a Weasley thickened her skin, and she was now rather used to letting things slide off her back.

But despite her insistence in her emotional strength, Ginny still ensured to avoid her elderly relative as much as she could. So she was currently hiding out in the upstairs rooms, setting them for the other imminent visitors instead of being down stairs with all the other residents.

Harry and Ron were currently at the Auror office, allegedly going in for something important, not that they could be certain of that, of course. So she was alone, folding up some spare blankets and clothes from the spare rooms, flicking her wand to place them back in their cupboards.

She had just finished the last room on her current floor when she heard some determined footfalls coming up the first set of stairs accompanied by a raised voice.

"These stairs really are quite impractical" The voice spoke condescendingly, "I told you last year Molly, are you a witch or not? These should be fixed before someone falls and snaps their neck!"

Ginny sighed and wiped a hand over her forehead, preparing herself to get through yet another confrontation.

"Ginevra!" The voice boomed from outside the door, Ginny barely stopped herself flinching.

"Aunt Muriel?" She called back politely.

The door opened up and Ginny was met with the hardened expression of an angry lady. Aunt Muriel wore a long set of robes which hung neatly from her shoulders ending at a practical length above her ankles. Her hair was tightly curled and accessorised with a large hat covered in long feathers of blue and pink. But the most eye-catching of all was her determined eyes which glared up at Ginny with a look similar to that of a bird of prey which had just found its lunch, but was still somehow disgusted by it.

It was a look Ginny had not seen anyone else master to the level that her aunt had.

"Where have you been?" She said accusingly.

Ginny tried her best to smile kindly, "Just getting the rooms ready for everyone, we're expecting a couple more people tomorrow-"

"Yes, yes. Well I should think that-"

She was interrupted when the wispy shape of an otter swam urgently into the bed room. Ginny would have laughed at the perfect timing, were it not for the concern she felt for the content of the message.

The otter floated elegantly to a stop in front of the pair of them, gave a sniff and a curious look at Muriel as if assessing her character and then finally turned to Ginny and spoke out in Hermione's voice.

"Hey Gin, I think I've found something" The otter said.

Ginny determinedly ignored the disgusted look Muriel gave at the sound of Hermione's voice. They had never taken well to each other.

"...meet me in the alley by the cafe if you're free"

The otter then swirled affectionately around Ginny's neck before curling in a tight circle and disappearing into nothing.

* * *

It was only about two minutes after Hermione sent her patronus that the pop of apparition alerted Hermione to Ginny's presence. She appeared a few feet to the right of where Hermione stood and walked up with an anticipatory expression on her face.

"What did you find then?"

"Well" Hermione began as they started walking back out onto the main road. They turned right, travelling in the direction of the Thames, which was thankfully not too far away from the cafe. "I came back to the cafe to rethink everything after the whole disaster with Vanhope".

Ginny nodded in agreement with her assessment.

"And I came to a few conclusions, but the most important right now is about the book itself. Remember when we were talking to Middleton he said he didn't make them himself, they're muggle made..."

"Yes!" Ginny said, "By the Thames, right? I'd completely forgotten about that. They must have bought the book there."

Hermione nodded, "Yeah, that's what I thought to. I don't really know why I didn't think of it before, but unless this store is one of many, or they only brought one book and would have gone below the radar, so to speak, we can probably find something out."

Ginny nodded with an appreciate smile. "Sounds like a plan. And thanks for sending your otter when you did; I was right in the middle of something with Muriel"

Hermione laughed, "You're welcome. How are you all doing?"

Ginny grimaced. "Not so well. You know how Mum gets when she's here"

Aunt Muriel seemed to have bad relationships with rather a lot of people, but especially with Molly Weasley. For some reason the two personalities always seemed to clash when they got together.

"She's keeping everyone busy though, so it's not so bad."

Hermione nodded.

The area of town they were walking through was a familiar one to Hermione. Not only was it in the centre of muggle London and near her favourite cafe, it was also very close to the entrance of the Ministry of Magic. Hermione briefly remembered when she, Harry and Ron had entered under Polyjuice potion gone looking for Umbridge during the war. She felt exhausted just thinking about it.

"So what were the other conclusions you made?" Ginny said, interrupting Hermione's musings.

"Well" She said, "the first was that me finding the book was intentional."

Ginny gave her a confused look, "Really? Why would that be?"

"It was quite a long train of thought" she said, "But surely if you had a book detailing my whole life, you'd know I go to that cafe and wouldn't _accidently_ leave it there for me to find?"

Ginny considered that, "yeah, I suppose you're right. Any other conclusions?"

Hermione paused for a second to make sure she would phrase this right. "Well... I was thinking about that last one, and about why someone would want me to have it, and I thought about what we did afterwards, in case everything is still going to their plan, you know?"

Ginny nodded, "Yeah".

"So," Hermione continued, "If what we did was what we wanted, the first thing we did was go see Scallion's because you saw Jones with an identical book _earlier_ _that day..."_ She drifted off hoping Ginny would follow her thoughts, and based on the conflicted look on Ginny's face, she probably had.

"You think it's not just coincidence." she said, "That Jones showed me the book."

Hermione nodded, and Ginny didn't speak for a minute as she mulled it over.

They continued walking through the streets, the elegant buildings around them passing them by as they focused on other things. They were finally reaching the Thames when Ginny spoke up again.

"I trust your judgement", she said hesitantly, "and when I first heard about the whole thing last week I admit I was a little suspicious too, but when we met up with her and saw her book was normal I dismissed it. I don't think she's doing anything dangerous, nothing like the people we're looking for."

Hermione rushed to put her friend's mind at ease, "No, no. I'm not saying she made the book or anything like that, just that she might be connected, someone might have mentioned her taking it to practice and subtly inspired her to do so without her even knowing. I just don't want to assume her unconnected prematurely."

Ginny nodded in agreement, "yeah. I guess you're right. We can search where that leads another time though. Let's start looking for this shop now then?"

While they had been speaking they had approached the Thames. The water was rippling softly in the autumn breeze and the covering of the overcast weather had dulled its colour to a murky grey.

So then, standing on the bank, Hermione and Ginny began their long search for a little muggle shop which sold little handmade books.

But for Hermione there was one thing she couldn't dismiss. Despite what she had said to Ginny just a few minutes ago, she couldn't discount Jones having a larger role in the whole plot. So, at that moment, Hermione resolved to keep a closer eye on Gwenog Jones.

* * *

 **I tried a bit of a strange style writing out her thoughts, but I hope it turned out alright – let me know what you think! I love hearing your thoughts and theories.**


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